


She's my Ride Home

by OfMonstersAndMe



Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Bonding, Gen, Growth, Hurt Tony Stark, Hurt/Comfort, Iron-man, Nebula & Tony Stark Friendship, Nebula (Marvel) - Freeform, Past Abuse, Past Torture, Planet Titan, Post Infinity War, nebula - Freeform, stranded in space, they are too cute together, tony stark - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-28
Updated: 2019-08-05
Packaged: 2020-02-09 06:38:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 26,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18632824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OfMonstersAndMe/pseuds/OfMonstersAndMe
Summary: [ENDGAME SPOILERS AHEAD!] Nebula thinks she gets it; how her sister came to love a Terran. Those 21 days spent drifting hopelessly through space on a broken ship may have been the best memories she'd ever had. [Tony & Nebula friendship]





	1. Strike a Match, Pour Gasoline

**Author's Note:**

> Title, and chapter titles in reference to 'She's my Ride Home' by Blue October.
> 
> Avengers belongs to Marvel.
> 
> This is for entertainment purposes only.

After all but herself and the wounded Terran crumbled away to dust, the remains of Titan fell into the familiar silence of a battlefield after Thanos had conquered it. For some time she feared her father would return for her. She kept casting glances over her shoulder as she moved through the wreckage, seeking the whereabouts of her sister's ship, half-expecting to find him standing atop the rubble somewhere, here to take her to the fabled garden he had promised so often when she was a child, or to finish her off once and for all.

A tiny part of her wished he  _would_  come and take her away, and her sister would be there waiting in the garden. Together, they would turn against the Titan, finally bring his twisted rein to the bloody end it deserved and then they would vanish together, free at long long last. If he truely had the stones, and it was more than evident that he did, then it should be a simple matter to bring her back from whatever fate she had suffered on Vorimir, right? And it seemed just the kind of unfair thing he would do- they could never be free of him, not even through death. Nebula still did not know how Gamora had met her ultimate end. Perhaps she had turned on their father when they discovered the stone, one final desperate attempt to stop him, and he had slain her there.

It was hard to imagine such a thing. In his eyes, Gamora could do no wrong. It was likely, Nebula would never know how her sister spent her final moments. She could only hope it had been swift.

Nebula wished her sister had just let her die on Sanctuary, and let Thanos's dreams die with her. She could have accepted death, gladly and gratefully, to snatch that finally victory from him.

The ship proved to be in one piece when she found it, but the damage it had taken was extensive, and the power cells were nearly destroyed. Freeing it from the rubble took hours, even with the greatly reduced gravity.

When she had the ship freed she returned to check on the remaining Terran, a bag of supplies slung over her shoulder. He had hardly moved since his companions had vanished. When she had last seen him he had still been curled in on himself, holding his bloody hands against his face as he stared with empty shock at the piles of dust around him. At some point he must have grown too exhausted to do even that, because on her arrival he was laying back, one hand pressed against the wound on his side and his eyes shut closed.

For a moment she thought he might be dead after all, survived the culling only to succumb to his wounds shortly after. It may have been a mercy if he had, but as she drew near he stirred and groaned and opened his reddened eyes to blink up at her.

"Did you find it?" he asked blearily.

"Yes." She kicked aside some rubble to clear a space beside him and sat down. "It's in no condition to fly."

"Yeah," the man sighed while Nebula rummaged around her bag, pulling out a bottle of water which she handed over. "I feel the same."

He took a long sip and immediately choked. Nebula snatched the bottle back so he wouldn't spill their very limited supplies while he rolled over on his good side, hacking and coughing. Once his coughs had trailed away into weak, heaving breaths, she handed it back.

"There's a possibility it can be fixed. Maybe."

"Okay," he rasped out, rolling onto his back with an obvious grimace of pain. "How far are we from the nearest gas station?"

The assassin tipped her head and regarded him strangely as she tried to glean the meaning to his babbling. "Without a jump point, we are at least twenty seven cycles from the nearest inhabitable planet or outpost." Longer still for anything useful, but she did not add that part.

"And this ship of yours, I don't suppose getting it 'jump worthy' again is much of an option?" he asked, but he stared up at the sky with blank eyes, obviously knowing the answer already.

"Not a chance." She returned to rummaging around in her bag, removing several packs of bandages, antiseptic wipes, and a handheld machine that assisted in stitching flesh back together. All standard medical gear, if somewhat outdated.

The Terran watched her spread out her supplies with the casual disinterest of someone who wasn't sure if they wanted to survive their injuries or not. It was a look and a notion she knew very well.

"You're more useful alive than dead," she told him, echoing the words her father had told her so many times when she wished for death, but he stubbornly refused to release her life from his possession.

The Terran screwed up his face in pain as she scrubbed the dirt and rust and other nasty things from his wound, cleaning the dried blood away and causing it to bleed again, sluggish and oozing.

"I don't seem to be much use either way," he ground out between clenched teeth.

She ignored his words and splashed his wound with some of their precious water before unraveling the first roll of bandages.

The Terran had succumbed to his exhaustion and fallen asleep before she even finished securing the wrap. She left him there to rest and returned to the ship to see what she could do. He must not have been out for long, however, as he made an appearance a short time later. Wordlessly, he limped his way over to where she kneeled over the remains of the gas-lines, re-working the tubes and repairing the countless cracks and holes. There, he settled down next to her and the sound of his labored breathing kept the pace as they worked in tandem.

-x-

There was no day and night cycle on Titan anymore. The remains of the planet drifted on without spinning, so Nebula measured imaginary cycles with an internalized clock that had been worked into her systems so long ago she could hardly remember a time without it.

By what would have been the midnight portion of the cycle, the Terran had developed a sheen of sickly sweat and Nebula sent him away before he made a mistake on the repairs that could cost them dearly. She found him later, not resting at all, but back where he had battled the Titan, crawling among the wreckage.

"You don't listen to orders well, do you?" she asked as she caught up to him. He was on his knees, sweeping together a pile of dust.

"Nope." His sarcastically happy answer may have had more power if his voice wasn't so tight with pain.

She took a seat on a nearby hunk of what may have once been a building and watched him work. "That was done with the power of the Infinity Stones. You can't bring them back."

"Well you're just a basket of inspiration, aren't you?" He finished scraping together every scrap of dust he could reach and sat back to stare at the pathetic mound of dirt before him. By Nebula's estimation, it may have comprised a quarter of a disassembled person at best, and was hopelessly mixed up with the planet's paler natural dust. "I'm not trying to bring them back," he sighed. "It just doesn't feel right, leaving them here like this."

"Was that your son?"

The question clearly caught the Terran off-guard and he stuttered a few times before answering. "Who? What? No. No, what would make you think that?"

"You held him as he died," she murmured thoughtfully. "He sought you out in his final moments. You seemed close." In her time under Thanos, she had watched many families die.

This earned her a strange look from the Terran, and he glanced around the rubble as though trying to figure out where she had been watching him from. "You noticed all of that? With a moon dropped on you?"

"I am an assassin. Noticing things is how I survive."

"Oh," apparently satisfied with that answer, he dragged a bag out from somewhere behind himself and carefully swept the pile of dust and dirt inside of it. "I have a friend like you, you know, back on Earth."

"There is no one like me."

-x-

By what would have been nearly morning, they doused the gathered ashes with engine fuel which had leaked from the ship, too filthy to be salvaged into anything useful, and lit them on fire.

"My name is Tony by the way," the Terran said, sitting on the ramp of the ship with his arms draped over his knees as he stared into the flames from underneath heavy lids.

"Nebula," she answered from where she leaned against the landing gear nearby, her arms crossed tightly over her chest. The smoke from the ashes billowed up in lazy clumps, and the acidic smell of chemicals stung her nose.

"Oh. That's a nice name. It suits you."

Nebula wasn't sure what to say to that. He was probably half-delirious with fever and exhaustion anyways.

The fire burned its self out, dirt reduced to ash. Nebula didn't see much of a difference, and returned to repairing the ship while Tony stared at the embers.

Mid-morning came and went before they had scrapped together enough of a working engine to get the ship turned on again.

Nebula wasn't even sure, as she helped the Tony hobble his way to the co-pilot's chair, that the batteries would hold long enough to get them out of the atmosphere. The compromised gravity may have been the only reason they succeeded, instead of plummeting back down.

"Wake me when we stop for snacks," Tony muttered as his reddened eyes slid shut. She left him to sleep fitfully in his chair and did what she could to keep the engines running while she ransacked the ship again for any sign of antibiotics.

**End Ch 1**

**Chapter 2 Preview:**  "... _Space is like, a kind of ocean," he offered in a painfully transparent attempt at conversation. "Y'know, this is going to be a much longer trip if we can't even talk to each other."_

 _"It's going to be long either way_..."


	2. I'll be Reaching for the Stars With You

**Chapter 2: I'll be Reaching for the Stars With You**

"Looks like a hurricane came through here." The Terran's voice rasped over the hum of the engine leaking from the opened panel.

Nebula carefully wound the plastic insulation tape over the exposed wire which had been sparking and threatening to blow a circuit to the atmosphere control unit. "Hurricanes occur over water."

Tony let out a burst of laughter that left him wheezing a moment later. "A woman after my own heart," he chuckled out between gasps of pain.

Nebula didn't look up from her work. "If I wanted your heart I would have cut it out while you slept."

His chuckles faded into a breathy laughter that sounded a little wetter than it had before to Nebula's enhanced hearing. "Natasha is going to love you."

She could hear him wandering around the room with uneven steps and inspecting various items that had been strewn about in the crash and then, later, her attempts to find the Terran some way to fight the infection that was clearly trying to take over his body.

"Space is like, a kind of ocean," he offered in a painfully transparent attempt at conversation. "Y'know, this is going to be a much longer trip if we can't even talk to each other."

"It's going to be long either way." She finished sealing off the defiant wire and tucked it away, closing the panel back into place.

"It's still nicer to have someone to talk to."

"Not always." Nebula turned to fix him with a sharp look which seemed to have no effect on him whatsoever.

He had a blanked wrapped around his shoulders which he must have stolen from someone's bed, and his forehead looked sweaty again, despite the fact that the ship was holding at low temperature right now.

"That brings me to a thought I had a while ago- how did I understand you all? Did your human friend Flash Gordon back there teach you all English or something?"

"You are hearing our universal translators," she said, rising to her feet and moving around him to sweep the items gathered on the table onto the floor. "I am not speaking English."

The Terran's eyebrows rose as he danced out of the way of the falling items. "That's handy. Don't suppose you have any extra ones I could tinker with while I'm here?"

"No." With the table cleared, Nebula retrieved the box of outdated medical supplies from where she had stowed it in a nearby drawer. She dropped the box onto the table and motioned for Tony to climb up. "Take off your bandage."

"I usually get dinner first," he grunted out as he draped the blanket onto a chair and hauled himself onto the table where she could see better in the ships dimmed lighting. The action left him panting as he unwound the bandages she had applied on Titan.

He was struggling to get his arms behind himself without further hurting his ribs and after a moment she smacked his hands away with a snort and took over.

"You're a lot grumpier than my usual nurses," he told her as she worked, apparently incapable of handling any length of silence. "Unless you count Pepper, then I guess this is about right."

The edges of his wound were puffy and red, and didn't appear to have made any progress towards healing beyond what she had done with the Suturim on Titan. It had only been a cycle and a half since he had received the wound, this infection was moving quickly.

She pressed her fingers experimentally against the flesh and he gave a yelp, jerking away from her.

"Don't  _poke_  it!" he snapped.

"The infection is trying to take hold. It's probably originating from somewhere deep inside of you." Whatever he had been run through with was certainly not very sterile. "I am not a surgeon, and we don't have anything here to kill the infection. You'll just have to take care of it and fight it off on your own."

"Great. I got space-rabies from a giant purple grape. I gotta say, this is not how I was expecting to go out, but don't worry, I'm a fighter. I've been told I'm too stubborn to die."

"You babble a lot," she breathed out, peeling open a new pack of antiseptic. "Is that normal for you, or has the fever affected your brain?"

"Uh... normal, I think. I'd worry more if it stopped-Ouch!" The Terran squirmed again as she scrubbed harshly against the open edges of his wound.

"Hold still."

"Well, you could be a little gentler about it, you know."

"This way is faster," she countered, ignoring his complaints and continuing to scrub away the dying flesh.

-x-

"So tell me about these 'Guardians' or whatever- what were they like?"

Nebula opened her eyes to regard her companion coldly. After spending the last half a cycle working tirelessly to keep the ship running, she was finally resting in the captain's seat. Tony was in the seat next to hers, huddled up under the same blanket from earlier, with strict instructions to wake her if something changed on the monitors. A glance around the cockpit proved that those requirements had not been met.

"Nothing has changed," she informed him, making it clear she was not amused, and closed her eyes.

"Sure it did."

Begrudgingly she cracked an eye open again to find him pointing at a series of numbers at the corner of a screen.

"This symbol here. It used to look like a... squiggly star thing, now it looks more like an upside-down happy face."

"It's the navigational system. The co-ordinates will change as we make progress across the galaxies."

"Oh." He squinted at the numbers. "Is that what that is? I can't read them."

"You wouldn't be able to understand what they meant anyways."

The cockpit was blissfully silent for all of three breaths.

"So this family of yours-"

"They were not my family," she answered tiredly, hoping to put an end to his curiosity. "They were my sister's."

"Doesn't that make them yours, too?

"Thanos stole us both from our homeworlds when we were children. We do not share blood."

"But you were raised together? So you must have been close, right?"

"Our father would pit us against each other in battle. Whenever I lost to Gamora, he would replace some part of me in the hopes of creating her an equal."

His brows raised as he stared at her as though noticing her modifications for the first time.

She leaned back and closed her eyes once more so she didn't have to see his face while he counted the failures immortalized into her flesh.

-x-

"Hey Nebula, what is this?"

Nebula set her tools down to accept the crinkling silver packet he was handing down to where she sat cross-legged on the floor. "It's food," she told him flatly. "You eat it."

"Yeah, I figured that, but what  _is_  it? I can't read the print, and I don't know if it's bad or just taste like shit."

She flipped the bag over in her hand to scan over the sparse labeling. "It's expired." That was disgusting. How had her sister lived with these idiots?

Tony tugged the ever-present blanket a bit tighter around his shoulders. "Expired like 'the grocery store can't sell it anymore,' or expired like 'time to call poison control?'"

A cautious sniff of the contents revealed it was just old, not rotten. "It's stale. You'll be fine." She handed the packet back to the nervous Terran. They couldn't really afford to be picky right now anyways. The Guardians had not kept a well-stocked ship, and they were a long way from fresh supplies, with no working radio and no way to send a hail for help. "Just don't break a tooth."

The Terran gave a grunt of acknowledgment and accepted the bag back awkwardly with his left hand, his right one clinging stubbornly to his side. Now that she looked, he seemed to be hunched over even more than he had been when she had cleaned the wound that afternoon. It was nearing what should be the middle of the night cycle now. He'd done little but sleep in the time between, he shouldn't look so terrible.

She took in a deep breath and let it out with a growl of frustration as she rose to her feet, abandoning her current project. It was hopeless anyways. The communication systems had been smashed and fried beyond what they had to the means to repair.

"Get on the table," she ordered, yanking open the drawer she had stored the medical supplies in with much more force than necessary.

"You can't want to change the bandage again already?" he asked, but struggled onto the table as requested. "How many rolls of that stuff do we even have."

"It doesn't matter," she grumbled, locating the medical kit she was after and returning to peel the bandage up enough to catch a glimpse of the discolored flesh underneath. "Your infection is getting worse."

The edges of the cut were starting to ooze and underneath an ugly yellow, parts were turning a deep purple which was spreading through the nearby veins, creating dark spider-webs lacing ominously up his side.

"Stay here." She stalked off into the ship's bathroom, locating a clean towel and ripping it into strips then filling a cup with hot water from the sink. Next, she tore through the cupboards and drawers until she found the salt. It was standard for most ships to carry some, at least. Most life forms required it to survive, and if you were desperate enough it had other uses. She placed her gathered items onto the table next to Tony, who was holding his side protectively and frowning down at her like he was already dreading what was to come.

When the bandage was unwound and the pus and dead tissue scraped from the wound she dunked a strip of towel into the warm salt water and handed it to the Terran who was laying misty-eyed with pain on the table.

"Soak it now."

He swallowed thickly as he accepted the scrap of cloth and pressed it against his raw flesh.

"We'll have to do this several times a cycle. I'll come back later to help you re-bandage it."

She left him on the table and returned to her hopeless attempt to draw the communication lines back to life long enough to send out an emergency hail.

**End Chapter 2**

**.**

**Chapter 3 Preview:**  "... _The screen was supposed to be displaying the engine's statistics; power input, fuel levels, temperature, and a handful of other useful things. Now it was just displaying a blown up image of the ship's batteries, the words 'POWER LEVEL CRITICAL; FAILURE IMMINENT' flashing over the icon_..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 2! I'm not used to writing with such short chapters, so the updates feel so fast. xD (My main project is usually 4-7k/chapter)
> 
> Don't take my medical stuff seriously. I am not a medical professional. I have no ground to stand upon there beyond my own experience.
> 
> The engines will be dying soon.
> 
> -OMaM


	3. I Set Fire to Everyone Around

**Chapter 3: I Set Fire to Everyone Around**

"Hey space-girl?" the Terran's voice echoed from the cockpit back to where Nebula was taking stock of their supplies. She'd found several stashes of snacks in various and increasingly bizarre places around the ship; under a mattress, behind a drawer full of replacement bulbs and fuses, and even taped to the underside of one of the engine coolant lines. That last one had been discovered by accident when she had been crawling through the engine to check how their repairs were holding up. It seemed when it came to favorite foods, there was little trust to be lost between the Guardians. "One of the monitors is blinking red and making a very unhappy noise."

Nebula quickly abandoned her mental inventory and raced to check on what was happening now.

"It's this one," Tony said as she arrived, pointing at a small screen to his left with a crack running through it from its time on Titan. The screen was supposed to be displaying the engine's statistics; power input, fuel levels, temperature, and a handful of other useful things. Now it was just displaying a blown up image of the ship's batteries, the words 'POWER LEVEL CRITICAL; FAILURE IMMINENT' flashing over the icon.

"What is it?" the Terran asked, tucking his hand back under the blanket. "Your face is telling me it's not good news..."

"No!" she shouted at the monitor, tapping instructions onto the screen, but it remained frozen stubbornly on the warning screen. With one final strike at the obstinate pad, she whirled and raced to the back of the ship to try to deal with the issue manually.

"WHAT IS IT!?" Tony's voice followed after her. "Do you need help?"

"Stay where you are!"

At the far end of the ship she ripped the panels to the engine open, flinging them across the cargo hold where they clanged against the walls and rattled to the floor while she all but dove into the mess of tubes and wires, clawing everything out of the way of the batteries. One was already blackened and dead, the now hollow casing cracked and melted. The second battery was flickering gold and green and spitting out sparks from large crack through it's center.

It had already been heavily damaged in the initial battle, and held together with little more than hope and luck, and some very creative wiring on her and the Terran's part, but the blast of the first one failing must have done it in.

With a sharp curse she pulled herself out from the mess of an engine and began digging through the ship for anything that might be used to patch the broken battery case. In her haste, she ripped entire drawers from their tracks, dumping their contents onto the table and then flinging everything onto the floor when drawer after drawer proved to contain nothing useful.

"Hey! Whoah! Easy there Tasmanian Devil!" the Terran yelped as he entered the area, just barely dodging the empty drawer she had flung in that direction. "What's wrong? What are we looking for?"

"We have one battery left, and it's leaking. I need something to seal it with." She ripped a storage panel off the wall that in most ships would be used to store smaller spare parts. Inside, she found a pair of headphones and and a novelty glass figurine shaped like a frog. With a scream of frustration she threw the contents on the ground along with every other worthless thing she had turned up, the figurine smashing into a thousand tiny shards at her feet. "How did those idiots survive so long?!"

The tangy smell of fried battery was leaking into the air, and the steady hum of the engines was beginning to stutter and cut out. They were nearly out of time.

"What about this?"

She whipped her head around to find the Terran had been rummaging through drawers on his own side. He held up a roll of some sort of thick blue tape, similar to what she had used before to coat the sparking wire. The fluid in the battery would probably rot straight through it, but it was worth a shot.

"Give me that!" She snatched the roll from his hand and shoved her way back to the batteries, stooping along the way to snatch up a shirt that had been in one of the table drawers for reasons she didn't care enough to wonder about.

The second battery was dimmer now than when she had left it moments ago. With the stolen shirt, she wiped up the fluid oozing from the crack, covering it up with strips of the blue tape as quickly as she dared without risking worsening the break.

It took several layers, but the tape seemed to hold, at least, and the sparks were no longer showering her hands while she worked. She checked the nearby lines for signs of damage she may not have noticed, so focused on keeping their power source alive, then cleared away the blackened remains of the first battery, dragging it out with her.

"So that's what smells like Clint's cooking."

The Terran was leaning over her, one shoulder pressed against the wall for support.

"Do you think the other one will hold?" He had one hand held out to her like he intended to help her up. Like he wasn't only barely managing to keep his own self upright.

She blatantly ignored the offered hand and wrapped the filthy shirt around the burned out shell. "Not for long."

-x-

The second battery gave out on what would have been late afternoon of their second cycle onboard the Guardian's ship. This time, there was nothing either of them could do to buy any more time.

"You know, my father used to be called a war-lord," Tony told her from where he laid next to her on the table, the only safe vertical surface left in the room after they had further torn the ship apart in their desperate attempts to find anything that might help breath life back into the engines.

"How many lives did he take?" She resisted the urge to shove the sweaty, smelly Terran off the table. His breathing was wet and labored in her ears, and she didn't know how fragile he was right now. The impact might harm him enough to influence the tide of his recovery.

"That depends on who you ask. No one, hundreds, thousands..."

"Thanos had slaughtered billions before he ever laid hands on the Infinity Stones."

"I wasn't really trying to compete, it's more like... commiserating."

She said nothing and they lapsed back into a silence made all the heavier by the loss of the ever-present hum of the engines.

"He was an inventor. He made weapons. I mean, he made other things, too, but the weapons were where the money was at, and the controversy."

She closed her eyes and began calculating how long they had until the oxygen ran out.

"He was a real hardass. I was his son, a reflection of him, so nothing I did was ever good enough. I always hated him, but I was also desperate to please him. To prove that I had some sort of worth that I couldn't put words to. He died before I could do that. And then, without even realizing it, I had become him."

The Terran would run out of oxygen long before she did. Her modifications would keep her going for cycles after his body had given up trying.

"I guess my old man won that one after all. But then... I changed. I don't do that anymore." She could feel him shift next to her, bringing up a hand, probably to stare at it with those hollow eyes. "I thought I had changed."

Some not-so-small part of her, a part responsible for her surviving in all the lessons Thanos had thought to bestow upon her, the part the Titan had cultivated so carefully within all his children, whispered that she could extend her own survival by doing away with her companion. He was injured and weak, and she was wasting a lot of resources on a stranger who was probably just going to die in a few cycles anyways. She shoved that part of her aside like she longed to shove the babbling man off the table.

"I have murdered hundreds in my father's name," she offered to distract herself from these thoughts.

"I just told you, this isn't a competition."

-x-

By the night cycle, he began shivering. It started as a faint trembling in his arms and progressed until the tool he'd been using to pry open a piece of tech he was curious about shook from his grip and the sound of his teeth clattering together could be heard throughout the ship. His jaw was shaking so hard, he couldn't even get whatever comment he had in mind out as she pressed her hand against his sweaty forehead, frowning at how cold he felt.

The lack of commentary as she draped his arm over her shoulder and more dragged than carried him over onto the table was not as enjoyable as she had imagined it being. Instead, it made her chest constrict uncomfortably.

Once she had him settled onto the table, she peeled back the bandage and found the spiderwebs of purple had inched their way even close to his heart just in the time since she had last helped him clean and soak it. The flesh which she had managed to urge into regrowth with the Suturim was red and weeping an ugly yellow pus. The infection had a foothold somewhere too deep within him to reach. There was nothing she could do against it, and the feeling of uselessness stuck like a barb in the back of her mind. She had extensive technical knowledge of the anatomy of most living creatures, and knew countless ways she could make him suffer or speed along the process of his death. Destruction and pain she knew very well. Healing, however, was a language she had never really learned to speak.

Still, her hands itched desperately to do  _something_. If nothing else, she could provide him some measure of comfort, perhaps. She had certainly watched enough times from her father's side as the hopelessly dying were given such by their scrambling, weeping loved ones. She had always found the display to be a waste of resources and time. Now, perhaps, she could see why they were driven to such measures.

The ship was unable to provide them with more warmth without risking the last of the life that lingered in the emergency life support. There was just barely enough to keep them from freezing to death without the heat of the engines or any nearby stars to act as suns. She dragged out every blanket or sheet she could find and buried the shivering Terran in them, folding up a faded red leather jacket that she was pretty sure had belonged to the half-terran as a pillow, and left him to shiver it out while she sat in the pilot's chair. There, she stared out at the stars and pretended not to hear his teeth clicking together and his occasional fevered mutterings. She didn't recognize any of the names he cried out for anyways.

**End Chapter 3**

.

 **Chapter 4 Preview:**  "... _I'd sell my entire company for a cheeseburger right now," he wheezed out as he sat hunched over the table, leaning his weight on his elbows. In his hands, he clasped a bag of Zarg Nuts with the words 'ROCKET'S; DON'T TOUCH UNLESS YOU WANT YOUR OWN NUTS BLOWN OFF!' scribbled across the packaging. The threat seemed null and void now. Not that the Terran could read it, anyways. "What about you, Space-Girl?_..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter down! Kind of a downer of a chapter, sorry. I'm hoping to get into the cute stuff again pretty soon. 
> 
> I'm still getting used to how short these are, too. But I worry if I make them any longer they'll just be confusing since it's more of a 'blips and glimpses' type of story than a detailed straight-through thing. IDK. I overthink things and worry too much sometimes. Anyways,
> 
> Thank you so much for all the comments! OMG! They've really been making my days! I appreciate them so much and am so glad that other people are enjoying reading this!
> 
> Love!
> 
> -OMaM


	4. Together Sharpening a Knife

**Chapter 4: Together Sharpening a Knife**

To her surprise, the Terran survived the night. She didn't say anything out loud, but she was certain she saw her own disbelief echoed in his watery eyes the next morning.

Again, she had the thought he seemed to more  _accept_  the fact that he was somehow still alive than welcome it.

"I'd sell my entire company for a cheeseburger right now," he wheezed out as he sat hunched over the table, leaning his weight on his elbows and holding a bag of Zarg Nuts with the words 'ROCKET'S; DON'T TOUCH UNLESS YOU WANT YOUR OWN NUTS BLOWN OFF!' scribbled across the packaging. A threat that was most likely null and void now. Not that the Terran could read it, anyways. "What about you, Space-Girl?"

"I don't have anything to sell," she told him from where she sat across the table, idly repairing a minor misalignment in her left wrist.

"Okay, now you're just being deliberately difficult," he griped, shoving another bite into his mouth and chewing as though his jaw weighed a thousand pounds. "What's your favorite food? They must have some good stuff in space."

"I don't have a favorite food."

"Liar."

She paused to regard the Terran who was staring back at her expectantly, then turned back to her arm. "You wouldn't know what it was, anyways," she mumbled, so quietly he might not hear.

"Do  _you_  know what a  _cheeseburger_  is?" he shot back, apparently regaining some of his earlier attitude. She couldn't decide if this was a good or bad thing. He slapped a hand against the table's surface. "That's it. When we get back to Earth, I am ordering us both the biggest, greasiest, cheesiest burgers the planet has to offer. You're going to love it."

The lack of food, sparse for her since even before the crash on Titan -her father not being one to afford more than the barest minimum to survive to his prisoners- must have been affecting her more than she thought, because her stomach twisted in a violent pang of hunger at the thought. The Terran must have read something in the surprise on her face, because a moment later he was stretching across the table, tipping the bag of stolen snack-food towards her. "Zarg Nut?"

"No, I ate while you were sleeping." Her enhancements meant she wasn't quite as reliant on such things. Her upbringing meant she was accustomed to going without. The Terran was sick, and needed it to heal.

Tony's mouth pulled into a frown as she refused the food. "Do you think I can't count?" he asked, managing to look affronted even through the exhaustion and sickness. "We have very finite supplies. I'll  _know_  if you're lying to me."

"I don't have the same requirements you do."

He dumped a handful of the nuts out onto the table in front of her, then sat back in his own seat and returned to eating in sullen silence.

-x-

"You should leave it uncovered now. Just keep it clean and let it breath."

Tony lay on his good side across the table, the blanket balled up under his head for a pillow and his shirt tugged out of the way while she ran the Suturim slowly across the flesh which was stubbornly refusing to heal with any sort of speed. The blackened veins, at least, appeared to have stopped growing, and the Terran had regained a more normal temperature. His violent shudders, too, had reduced to just occasional tremors.

It was progress. Slow and tedious progress.

"Probably for the best," he mumbled back, voice tight with pain. "I think those wraps were chaffing me anyways. I'm told I have great skin, but it's a little sensitive to cheap fabrics. I don't think those were organic."

She tucked the remaining medical supplies back into the kit, including the remaining salt, though now they had no way to warm the water, and cleared away the dirty bandages and saltwater. With that done, she returned to help him up and off the table.

"Are all you Terrans so annoying?" Her sister's Terran had also babbled relentlessly from what she could recall.

Tony blinked back at her, his face uncomfortably close as he leaned on her shoulder so she could guide him to the co-pilot's chair. Suddenly, his lips quirked into a smile and his eyes seemed to brighten up with something other than a fever sheen. "Oh good. It's been a few days since a woman called me that. I was starting to think I was losing my touch. I must be getting better already."

"I'm sure."

-x-

"I never had any siblings." Tony was huddled up in the co-pilot's chair, his legs drawn up under the blanket so that only his head stuck out of the pile of cloth. His chin was lit up a soft blue from the glowing plate on his chest. "My dad kind of always wanted a daughter, I think, but my mom said one kid was enough. It's probably for the best, I would have been a terrible older brother."

Nebula was reclined in the pilot's seat, her feet thrown up on the lifeless controls as she watched the stars drift by and considered the likeliness of anyone traveling close enough to pick them up on their radar.

"Were you the older sister or younger?"

"I was the youngest of Thanos's children."

"Wait, there are more of you guys? Where are the rest?"

"Dead. Or else content licking the Titan's boots." Maybe they were in the garden with her father now. Another shudder ran up her spine at the thought and she was again grateful that Thanos had never thought to come back for her. He probably never would have brought her along anyways. Even if she hadn't betrayed him.

"Did he kidnap them, too?"

"No. The others came to him willingly. From what I understand they were already adults when they took the title of Children of Thanos."

"Children of-? Wait, were those wierdos who came to Earth after the Magic Man's Eye of Garbanzo your siblings?"

Nebula wrinkled her nose. "In name only."

"Well, I'm not entirely sure what happened to the big guy beyond being dropped through a portal, but the Maw, if I'm saying that right, is dead."

She finally turned her head to face him. The white's of his eyes looked especially large, and the dark sparkled with dozens of stars reflecting in them. She was certain she saw a hint of either fear or pity, maybe both. "Good," she grunted out, returning her gaze to the stars outside and settling more comfortably into her chair. "I always hated him."

-x-

"Need some help?" The Terran's voice interrupted Nebula's concentration and the wire she'd been carefully realigning slipped, a shock running through her nerves and up her spine where it made contact against the wrong port.

"I thought you were sleeping," she growled, letting her annoyance announce itself plainly in her tone as she tried to wrangle the loose wire in her left shoulder back into position. Her right arm was growing tired, doing such delicate work at such an awkward angle, but the discomfort of the damaged cybernetics was beginning to grow unbearable with nothing else to distract her.

"I was. I think I bored myself awake, though."

"You need rest to heal." And to preserve oxygen and calories.

"If I rest any more, I'll legally be in a coma." His footsteps left the entrance to the cockpit, and a moment later he was at the table, flopping down into the chair next to her. "Come on, let me see."

One pale hand began to reach for her injured shoulder and she flashed him a dark look of warning. "I don't need you're help!" she snarled.

He yanked his hand back as though suddenly afraid she might bite it, his brows rocketing up towards his hairline, obviously startled by her response. She returned to what she had been doing without apology. Clearly, she had been too soft on him in his injured state, and the Terran was growing way too comfortable around her.

In the resulting silence, she could feel his gaze boring into her. His surprise morphed into a deeply thoughtful expression while she watched him from the corner of her eye.

Eventually he straightened up in his seat, pulling his hand back under the blanket and bundling the covers tightly around himself, as though making it clear he had no intention of using his hands in any sudden movements.

"I'm sorry." His voice was different now, missing his usual sarcastic tone. "I didn't think that through. Can I start over?"

She curled her lip into another warning snarl, but was too busy trying not to lose the wire again to spare him a reply. Apparently, he took her silence as an invitation to do just that.

"Would you like some help?"

"No."

"I promise, I know what I'm doing. I won't mess it up. And look, my hands aren't even shaking anymore." Here he shoved one hand back out from under his blanket, holding it off to the side in a transparently non-threatening gesture than only made her frown deepen. She did not need to be treated as the invalid here. "That's thanks to you. I'm not doing you any favors here, just repaying my debt."

"No." The wire slipped again and she flinched as her arm spasmed.

The Terran watched her through narrowed eyes and pressed his lips into a thin line as she struggled to regain her grip with her aching arm. "Let me fix it. Just give me five seconds," he bartered, "and then I swear I'll go back to sleep and leave you alone for the rest of the night."

She bit and bruised her lip as the wire danced out of her failing grip once more. Her arm twitched as another shock ran up her nerves.

"It's got to be easier than dislocating your other shoulder...  _Two_ seconds?"

"Fine!" Her good arm dropped, not entirely on her own command, as she gave up. "Two seconds. And then you go away, whether you fix it or not."

Tony brightened at his victory, but didn't immediately spring up. Instead, he slowly removed his blanket and draped it over the back of his chair, then held his hands up in invitation. With another low growl of warning, Nebula forced herself to turn around and show him the opened panel on the back of her left shoulder. "The green wire needs to connect to the same port."

"Okay. Here I go." There was a slight tug, and a spark of feeling as the wire was finally returned to its intended place, and then the Terran was up and gathering his blanket. As promised, he vanished without another word, and she was left to unwind her frozen muscles and test her hand in peace and silence.

**End Chapter 4**

**Chapter 5 Preview:**  "... _Supposedly, they were seeing if anything could be salvaged from it to be worked into some other part of the engine. Mostly, though, Tony was studying how it had been built in the first place while she occasionally offered the names to pieces he didn't recognize_ _or offered explanations for how they would have interacted with the pieces that were now missing_..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so I was a little meaner than I intended to be to Nebula in this chapter. She's been getting off easy in my main fic lately, so I guess I'm getting a few minor kicks in here to kill the time until her next big gut punch. lol. I'm a mean author, I guess. I believe in making them suffer through growth the hard way. Hopefully it'll make for a natural sashay into her growing to trust him in turn.
> 
> I'll be honest, I'm still not 100% sure who exactly the 'of all of our siblings' line refers to in Vol 1. In a lot of the comics, the Black Order (Corvus, the Maw, and them) are referred to as the Children of Thanos, so I'm just kinda going with that along with Korath who was treated like Gamora and Nebula's brother of sorts in the cartoons. *shrugs helplessly*
> 
> Thank you for reading!
> 
> Love, love, love!
> 
> -OMaM


	5. Like Killing Partners for a Life

**Chapter 5: Like Killing Partners for a Life**

True to his word, she didn't see Tony again until she came to bring him food and inform him it was time to clean out his wound the next morning cycle.

"How's your arm?" he asked, staring at the wall across from him as she set aside the used gauze and handed him the cold, wet rag to press against his side.

"Functional." It no longer ached, and her relief at the sudden lack of pain was strong, but she would throw herself from the airlock before she admitted she had benefited from anyone's kindness.

Tony did not press for any form of gratitude or demand repayment, and instead moved on to another subject.

"So why are there no books in space?"

He filled the time until he was cleared to move around again peppering her with seemingly endless questions about the mundanities of life with space travel. Nothing of any real meaning was discussed, but it served to clear the air between them.

By mid-cycle they were sitting side by side on the floor of the common room. A small space had been cleared of debri and in it they were pulling apart the remains of what would have been the backup generator had it not been smashed in half on Titan. Supposedly, they were seeing if anything could be salvaged from it to be worked into some other part of the engine. Mostly, though, Tony was studying how it had been built in the first place while she occasionally offered the names to pieces he didn't recognize or offered explanations for how they would have interacted with the sections that were now missing.

"That's a pretty ingenious way to move so much power through such a small line," he grinned as he twirled a set of wires between his fingers. The glow from his chest provided most of the light they were working by, and everything was washed in a cool blue. "I was wondering how such a small generator was supposed to power this whole ship."

"Only for a short period," she clarified, "and it is designed to bypass the engines and run the basic life functions and communication systems of the ship, that's all."

"Still... Very neat." He set the wires down and move on to studying the next bit of tech he could get his hands on. There was a smile on his face as he worked. It was subtle and tired, but had a sincerity to it that was foreign to Nebula's eyes. She caught herself glancing up at it now and then, as though waiting for it to change into something more familiar; sarcasm, sadism, mockery, anything that she could hate or fear or make enough sense out of to know how to respond. She didn't know what to do with this soft innocence as he hummed and bobbed his head while he worked. Occasionally he'd catch her staring and offered her her own, slightly brighter smile.

-x-

"Can I ask you another question?"

"Nothing has managed to stop you so far."

They were sitting together at the table, the more interesting pieces of tech they'd stripped from the generator spread out between them. Tony was rolling a screw between his fingers, studying its shape.

"If your father got all of the Infinity Stones, and had the power to warp reality to his will, why didn't he fix his homeworld? I mean, that's the first thing I would have done. But nothing changed. He didn't even bring back half of them or whatever his agenda was."

"My father was never interested in saving anyone," Nebula told him, the piece of tech in her own hands suddenly losing what little appeal it had. "This was just about proving he was right."

"Oh." The Terran lowered the screw, rolling it between his fingers thoughtfully. "You know, people used to say that about me..."

Nebula raised her eyes to regard him.

"They were wrong, of course," he amended quickly, as though he'd just realized he'd said that out loud. "But, maybe I can see why it scared them so much to think that..."

His gaze flickered up to meet hers with an unspoken question, and traces of a fear she knew all too well. The fear of someone who had given a wrong answer, and knew that there would be consequences to come.

She let him suffer in silence for a moment, as he seemed so keen on making her suffer, before she gave him his answer in turn.

"If you were anything like my father, you wouldn't have needed to ask that question," she finally said, and his shoulders sagged with relief at her forgiveness.

-x-

"Hey Space-Girl, you wanna play a game?"

"You are in no condition to survive such a thing."

The Terran pursed his lips together and gave her a strange look from where he sat on his chair and watched her tinker with the pieces they had removed from the generator earlier that cycle. "I mean like, a table game." He held up the wrapper to the rations he had finished off earlier that cycle, folded into a thick triangular shape. "Like football?"

"That's not a ball. And keep your feet off the table. It's already unsanitary enough."

She turned back to her work, but the Terran's laughter rang out from behind her. "That's just the game it's named after. Come on, I'll teach you how to play. It'll be fun, I promise."

The project she'd been working on was hopeless anyways. It had passed the point of killing time and was just making her angry now. A distraction, however ridiculous, might be forgivable. With a sigh she set her tools down and rose to join him at the table.

"Alright!" His teeth flashed in a bright grin as she approached. "Just take a seat right across from me."

She did so, settling into the chair he had indicated and eyeing him suspiciously. He had no weapons that she was aware of, and was still too weak to offer any sort of threat, especially from where he sat, huddled in on himself for warmth and clearly favoring his left side. Perhaps he was intending to gamble, though there was nothing here of value to bet.

"So," he held up the folded piece of food wrapper, "this is the 'football' and the table is the field. And our hands are going to be the little players and goal posts. The game is to win points by flicking the ball over the other person's hands."

She narrowed her eyes at the supposed ball, not sure what the point of this exercise was supposed to be.

"Here, I'll go first and show you what I mean. Hold your hands like this." He shrugged off his blanket and leaned over the table to hold his arms out so that just the tips of his index fingers met, the other fingers curled into fists and his thumbs sticking out and straight upward.

Slowly, still not sure that she wasn't going to end up the butt of some joke or that this was somehow an elaborate prank, she mimicked his pose.

"A little more like this," he said, wiggling his hands for emphasis. When she just frowned at him, not sure what the difference was, he instead held his hands out towards her cautiously. "May I?"

She allowed him to adjust her hands through delicate nudges. Once he was satisfied, he sat back and picked up the food wrapper, balancing it between one finger and the table. "So now, I'm going to flick it."

The little piece of trash sailed through the air and she snatched at it as it passed over her hands, slamming it down onto the table with a bang that made the Terran jump in his seat. Ah, so it was a reflex exercise. A little childish, but something the Terran could do without straining himself, at least.

The Terran stared back at her through wide eyes, one corner of his lips pursed into a baffled frown. "That's not, quite right," he said slowly, "but good hustle."

He held his hand out for the foil 'ball' and she returned it. The trash triangle was set back up, and Nebula obligingly set her hands back into the required position. Again, the trash sailed through the air. This time she swatted it aside before it could cross over her hands. The Terran startled again at her sudden movement.

"You don't need to do that," he said slowly as he settled back down, "because, uh, you're just holding a position..."

He brought his own hands into the strange formation he had shown her. "Look, you give it a try."

Still not entirely convinced there wasn't some trick here, she lined up the triangle as he had done it and gave it a solid flick. The triangle sailed off down the length of the table.

"That was close," Tony said, his browsed raised high as he reached to retrieve the folded wrapper and hand it back to her. "I took two turns, so go ahead and go again."

A wave of frustration washed over her skin as she lined the supposed ball up again, narrowing her eyes and studying the short space between them carefully. This time the piece of trash flipped too far upward, and came down near his elbow.

"Here." He grabbed the foil triangle and lined it up, waiting for her to make the symbol with her own hands again. "The trick is to not focus on strength. It's too weak and light weight, it'll just catch the air and flip around unpredictably. When you flick it, hold your fingers like this, flick from below, and make sure you loosen your grip with your other hand." This time she held her hands still as he flicked the triangle and it sailed easily over her fingers to land on her side of the table.

"Your turn again."

Carefully, she followed his instructions, and was surprised when the ball actually made it to its intended target as he had promised.

"That's a goal," he told her with a nod. "We are now one a piece."

"I would like to try again," she breathed, worried that the game was over now that she knew enough to have a fighting chance.

"Okay, how does first one to five goals sound?"

She nodded quickly, too quickly, then caught herself and schooled her features back into careful disinterest. "That would be alright."

The time slipped away all too fast as they took turns flicking the piece of trash back and forth, missing at least as often as they made their goals. More than once she caught her lips twitching upwards into a smile and had to will them back down into a more neutral expression.

"Now we're all tied up," Tony informed her as she made her fourth goal. His voice was starting to lose it's usual edge and he seemed to be growing tired again. "Do you feel the tension? It's fun." His next attempt sailed wide down the table much as her first one had.

"See now that was terrible," he said, lining his hands up again. "So now you have a chance to win."

Her next try flipped high in the air and landed quite neatly on the table inside of the cage of his arms.

"And, you've won."

She straightened up, leaning back from the table slightly, not sure what happened next.

"Congratulations. Fair game." Tony held his hand out towards her, and after a moment's hesitation she took it. "Good sport. Did you have fun?"

"It is fun," she murmured, surprising herself with the honesty behind the statement even as it passed her lips. Despite herself, she was sorry to see the game end.

A huge yawn took over Tony's face as he released her hand to tug his blanket back over his shoulders. "I'm beat. I think I'm going to take a nap now." He stood and vanished into the cockpit, and just like that he was gone. The game had ended, with her the victor, and she sat at the table staring at the little folded piece of trash. A small spark of something so rare and unfamiliar in her life that its appearance startled her fluttered about in her chest. A visitor so scarce and maltreated that she feared putting a name to it or looking at it too closely, lest it bite her in turn.

Happiness.

**End Chapter 5**

**Chapter 6 Preview:**  "... _Someone out there is unfortunate enough to have to marry you?"_

_Tony let out a chuckle. "Yeah, that's pretty much the usual response I get when I tell people. But she agreed, willingly, I swear."_

_"That poor girl."_

_He reached forward to trace his fingers slowly over the face of the helmet. "Yeah. I know_..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the no update yesterday. I was working on some other projects along with this one. Have an extra long and warm mushy chapter to make up for it!
> 
> I did make some Nebula and Tony art for my tumblr [ caffeineandconceptart] if anyone's interested. Nothing big, just a warmup since I haven't drawn as much lately, but I do plan to do some doodles for this fic, specifically at some point.
> 
> Thank you all again for those comments! I swear my heart's going to explode!
> 
> I had some people ask about Pepper and Gamora. Pepper, as you can tell, is going to come up a bit in the next chapter, and I do have some stuff about Gamora in mind, but I'm not sure yet where exactly she'll come up. :) We have time, still.
> 
> -OMaM


	6. Ditch the Scene and Watch this City Burn

**Chapter 6: Ditch the Scene and Watch this City Burn**

"Who is that for?" It was Nebula's turn to be the nosy one. The Terran had been recording messages onto the broken helmet of his suit for cycles, and boredom had finally driven her to ask.

"Oh, hey Space girl," he greeted her, lowering the hunk of half-melted machinery back to the floor. "It's for my fiancée, Pepper."

"Someone out there is unfortunate enough to have to marry you?"

Tony let out a chuckle. "Yeah, that's pretty much the usual response I get when I tell people. But she agreed, willingly, I swear."

"That poor girl."

He reached forward to trace his fingers slowly over the face of the helmet. "Yeah." he murmured. "I know."

-x-

"Do you have marriage ceremonies where you're from?"

The Terran was reclining in the co-pilot's chair again, tossing a scrap of now-useless tech up in the air and catching it with his good arm. His left was held tightly against his side, which was still sore from the last time Nebula had cleaned it. The infection was finally starting to find itself on the losing side of the battle and the darkened stains running through his veins were retreating.

"I was raised on Sanctuary with Thanos and his army, but I believe the planet I was born on had such a ritual. Unity ceremonies are fairly common in various forms throughout the galaxies."

"Huh," he grunted. "What are they like? Just the really cool ones. I could use some ideas. We haven't actually planned much."

Her shoulders rolled into an awkward shrug against her own seat. "I wouldn't know. They weren't a subject of interest in my training."

"Pepper wants an outdoor wedding. A smaller one. Close friends and family type of thing. I'm thinking maybe by the ocean. Have you ever been to the ocean?"

"I've been to hundreds of oceans on hundreds of planets."

"Okay, but have you like  _been to the ocean_?"

She turned her head to give him a strange look. He was getting eccentric again.

"Like on a vacation?" he pressed, catching the item one last time then rolling over in his seat to face her better. "A beach day?"

Maybe the low oxygen levels were affecting him more quickly than she had anticipated.

She knew she was going to regret the question even before she asked it, but it was better than the silence of the ship slowly turning into a coffin around them, so she resigned herself for a slew of nonsense and asked. "What is that?"

"A beach day?"

"A vacation."

As predicted, the Terran had spoken at great length of all manner of things relating to Earth's ritual of vacation. From favorite locations to the nearly endless list of games one would most often play there.

"If you thought table football was fun, just wait until you learn how to play board games. Maybe not Scrabble, I'm not sure how the tiles would work with your translator, but checkers, everyone likes checkers. Oh, or card games, like Uno. I'm sure you could memorize the numbers easy enough, you seem very observant."

After he finished listing a number of favored games, he lost himself recounting especially important victories and losses against companions on these vacations in between yawns. He drifted off in the middle of a story about a man named Happy struggling to learn how to do something called surfing.

Careful not to wake him, Nebula removed the piece of machinery from his hands before he could drop it.

As she stood over the sleeping Terran, the shadows underneath his eyes making his face look more hollow than ever in the frozen starlight, she felt a wave of unwelcome pity for the man who would probably never see these things he spoke so fondly of again. Even more surprisingly, came a strange sense of loss at the thought that she would never see them either, and maybe, a small part of her might like to.

She gave herself a violent mental shake, shoving these terrible, senseless thoughts away into the darkest corner she could find. It was just wishes and stories, there was no purpose for her in such a place. She left the Terran to sleep, the piece of tech retrieved from his hands held in a crushing grip as she returned to the common room to lose herself in whatever hopeless project she could find.

It was just another promised garden.

Just another world not meant for her.

-x-

"So what do you usually do for fun when drifting through space? There's no books here, and I haven't seen any T.V.'s, unless one of those little monitors picks up HBO."

Tony gave the tinfoil triangle another flick. It sailed true and landed neatly on the table behind her hands.

"I don't usually do anything for 'fun,'" she snorted, making no secret of how inane she found that question as she lined the piece of trash up on her own side of the table. "If I am not busy achieving my next goal, I am training, or resting."

Another flick. It wobbled in the air, but made its way over his hands to her target nonetheless.

"Fun is just a distraction. It makes you weak and vulnerable." Her mouth echoed the words drilled into her since her childhood, like a programmed response.

"Yeah," Tony retrieved the folded up wrapper and twirled it around in his fingers. "You look about ready to drop dead there. Any second now."

Nebula stiffened, suddenly alarmed, then caught sight of his soft smile. Oh, he was just joking. As her heart slowed to its regular pace and she forced her tense muscled to unwind, he seemed to realize what he had done and a flicker of guilt crossed his now-perpetually tired eyes.

"Come on," he moved the subject along, mercifully pretending he hadn't noticed her flinch. "You must have something you enjoyed doing? I'm a workaholic myself, but there was always at least something about the work I enjoyed."

She cursed herself for her childish reaction and fought the urge to reach across the table and physically shake the pity from his eyes. Suddenly she didn't want to play this stupid game anymore.

"I should be working on the ship." She rose from the table and deliberately turned her back on her companion to retreat to the cockpit where she could tear apart something real in place of her feelings.

"Nebula?" The Terran's voice trailed after her, quiet and uncertain through the silence of the dying vessel.

She ignored him and found a panel along the edge of the console which could be pried open, and settled down on the floor in front of it, wishing, not for the first time, that there was anywhere on this ship to be alone.

Soft footsteps shuffled into the cockpit after her, hesitating in the middle of the room. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to do that. I'm always putting my foot in my mouth. It's a special talent of mine."

With a small grunt of pain, he lowered himself down to sit on the floor between two of the seats, close enough to speak, but too far to touch. He had brought the little piece of trash with him, and fiddled with it as he spoke. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"No."

"That's okay. I get it."

A long stretch of silence followed, punctuated only by the rattling of wires and the soft crinkling of the tinfoil triangle as the Terran carefully unfolded and refolded it.

"Do you want me to go?"

She said nothing, half-way through the process of losing herself in the work. If she pulled herself back enough to answer, she would have to start over again.

The Terran stayed. He bundled a corner of his blanket up to make a pillow and leaned against a nearby seat. There, he remained silent and watched her through eyelids that refused to stay open for long. Eventually the sound of his soft snoring alerted her that he had fallen asleep.

-x-

"I used to enjoy reading."

Tony snorted and jolted awake from where he had fallen asleep against the chair nearly a quarter cycle earlier. "Wha?" he breathed out, rubbing at his neck which was probably sore after so long in such a poor position.

When her latest project had proven as useless as all the others, she had moved to lay in the pilot's chair again and stare up at the galaxies surrounding them.

"My father allowed it, so long as I was studying something useful, and sometimes it would give me an edge over my sister. If I knew something useful that she didn't, he might look at me for a moment like I was... real."

She didn't know why she was telling him this, the words tumbling out of their own accord. Perhaps because they were both going to die here anyways, so there was nothing more to be lost.

"When even that wasn't enough to let me defeat my sister in combat, he had my mind enhanced, over and over again, so I could process faster, remember better, so I could bypass the need to read at all and download information directly into my mind. I don't enjoy reading anymore."

The stars through the windshield above stared back at her, as though counting all the things her father had taken from her.

Slowly, Tony pulled one hand from the shelter of his blanket and held it out, the tips of his fingers brushing up so close to hers that she could feel the air they had disturbed against her skin. She kept her face turned towards the stars as she opened her own hand and he slipped his inside. His skin was warm, and calloused, and alive. After a moment he gave her hand a light squeeze and then let it go. His hand tucked back under his covers as his eyes blinked closed. His snoring once again filled the cockpit.

Nebula furrowed her brows. He'd left something behind in her palm. When she lifted it up, she found the little triangle of trash sparkling back at her. It crinkled as she closed her fist around it and rested her hands across her stomach. Something almost like a smile, soft and painless, tugged at her lips as she finally closed her own eyes and allowed herself to rest as well.

**End**

**Chapter 7 Preview** : "... _Does it seem a little colder in here to you?"_

_"Another fuse blew on the atmosphere control unit some time this morning cycle."_

_"Oh," he repeated. "That's great. I was worried my fever was coming back._.."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A long delay on this one sorry. I've been busy IRL and trying to pay attention to my other projects as well. I very much still intend to finish this, at least through rescue and probably with some stuff after they get to Earth as well.
> 
> Thank you again so much for the comments! They just make my day whenever I see them!
> 
> -OMaM


	7. We Can Hide the Bodies on the Ride Home

**Chapter 7: We Can Hide the Bodies on the Ride Home**

"What'cha doing there, Space-Girl?"

Nebula glanced up from where she was wading knee-deep in wires and scrap pulled from what was most likely the Fox's stash. She wasn't sure what she was looking for exactly, but she knew she hadn't found it yet.

Tony was leaning against the entrance to the cockpit, looking disheveled and still half-asleep. A large clump of his greasy hair stuck out in all directions.

"Searching the trash for anything of use the fox may have had hidden away."

"Oh." He took a long look around the room. "Does it seem a little colder in here to you?"

"Another fuse blew on the atmosphere control unit some time this morning cycle."

"Oh," he repeated. "That's great. I was worried my fever was coming back."

Her lips tugged into a deep frown and she took a better look at his face. He did seem a bit paler than before, but it could just as easily be the thin rations he was on making him appear so sickly. Certainly, he'd lost a significant measure of weight since Titan. The room echoed with the rattle and clank of metal as she kicked her way free of the pile of tech, crossing the distance in several quick strides so she could press her hand against his forehead once more.

The Terran's eyes nearly crossed as he stared up at her hand, clearly baffled by her sudden action, but he didn't challenge her.

"You are fine," she informed him, drawing her hand away and returning to her work, satisfied that he was not in any more immediate danger than they had already been in.

"You can feel temperature with that hand? With such detail?"

Nebula was confused by the question for a moment before she realized she had used her left hand to feel his forehead.

"That's some pretty advanced tech. I don't think even Bucky's arm can do that."

"Yes. Temperature, pressure, pain. Just like real nerves. It was important to my father I could still feel all these things. In all of my augmentations." She rolled her fingers and allowed the plates and panels in her right arm to shift, the light from the wiring and circuitry underneath leaking through. A sadistic part of her almost enjoyed the way she had caught him so off-guard and he failed to completely conceal his surprise and faint horror at the realization.

It took a moment for him to recollect himself and find his voice again. "How, um- If you don't mind me asking-" He clearly knew he was tiptoeing through a minefield, but his doe-eyed, terrified persistence and her own enjoyment at watching him as he visibly struggled to regain his balance was keeping her more bemused than angry. For now.

"How far do they run?" she asked for him. "All of me. I've lost track of how many times my father had me 'upgraded.'" That was a blatant lie. She knew exactly how many times, but she had never shared the number with anyone. Not even Gamora had known anymore how many times their father had cut her apart.

The Terran fell silent after that, his gaze drifting to something beyond the walls of the vessel as he lost himself in a deep thought.

Her amusement fizzled away at his reaction. Horror she could take, was accustomed to really, it was better than pity or being looked down upon, anger and even bias was predictable enough in the back alleys of space she was used to wandering, but the look he wore, like he had just discovered a new tool and was thinking up ways to use it sent all sorts of shudders crawling across her skin.

" _What_?" she demanded, sharply.

The Terran blinked and started as though he hadn't realized that he had drifted off. The action left him wobbling and he had to grab the nearby frame to stay upright. "Sorry. Sorry. I was just... thinking about a friend of mine. He has a... spinal injury and Earth medical technology can only do so much. If your tech out here in space is so advanced, though. If you can reconnect nerves with such skill then... I hadn't really considered the differences in our medical tech is all. It's not usually my area of focus..."

The ship fell into a silence then in which the Terran was visibly struggling. When he couldn't seem to take it anymore he tried awkwardly, "I made myself a heart once though."

Here he let go of the frame with one hand to tap the glowing plate on his chest.

"That's your heart?" she asked without realizing it.

"Well, no, not anymore," he admitted. "It's more a reminder. I was in a blast, and I used to have a machine that kept some shrapnel from moving around and cutting into my heart. Years later I finally had the surgery to remove the pieces, and it healed. I don't need it anymore."

"Ah." She returned to her pile of scrap, wading her way back to where she had left off. "Mine cannot be removed. Or healed."

"Fair enough," he said, taking her cue that their conversation had ended and leaving the doorway to make his slow way over to her pile of scrap. "Would you like some help?"

She pointed at the corner near where he stood which she had yet to look through. "You can start there."

-x-

As predicted, there was nothing useful to be found in the fox's scrap heap, but the Terran had found a small armload of pieces that had interested him. These were now piled up on the table next to him while they ate. For every three or four bites he took, he would slide the ration pack over to her side of the table and refused to take it back until she had at least one bite as well. He was a persistent companion, obnoxious really, and had refused to accept any lesser deal on her part.

"You have a lot of friends," she told him, rolling a piece of his chosen tech between her hands.

"Can't help it. I'm a people person."

"You are, evidently, considered very skilled and well-off among your people."

"You can just say it; you think they only like me for my fame and fortune."

She spared him a glance, surprised he had picked up her underhanded accusation so quickly.

"You're not the first one to think that," he told her, sliding the bag in his hands over across the table once more. "And oh boy would I be lying if I said it wasn't true. Everyone wants to be your friend when you're the golden goose, ever since I was a kid, but it just makes the real ones all the more special. And I do have plenty of real ones nowadays. The fake ones can be pretty fun sometimes, too, just between you and me. It's easy to get lost in it, but Pepper looks out for me. I'd be pretty lost without her."

Nebula chose a small piece of the jerky-like rations they were working on and shoved the bag back towards the Terran. "What is a 'golden goose'?"

Rather than take another bite, Tony began resealing the bag. She pursed her lips, a little annoyed that he had tricked her into that last bite when he clearly had no intention of continuing with the meal, but he ignored her disapproval and answered her question. "It's just an old term from a fairy tale, meaning people treated me like I was going to lay golden eggs."

"So... you were a favorite?"

"I think People Magazine said that once, yeah."

"Like my sister. She was Thanos's favorite, of all of his children. She had things given to her, subtle allowances such as finer equipment or overlooking minor mistakes, afforded to her in deference to my father's favor."

Tony had been in the middle of reaching for a piece of the tech himself but paused. "I thought he killed her?"

"Yes. He cared enough to mourn her, though." It still surprised her a bit that he had, but Mantis wouldn't lie about such a thing, and Nebula had known her long enough to respect the empath's impressive powers. The Titan would not have mourned his youngest daughter. A spark of jealousy, disgusting in more than one way, writhed within her and she squashed it mercilessly, grinding it into dust. The tech in her hands was placed down on the table and she began to pull it apart, careful to keep the individual parts intact for the Terran to study later. Again she wished her sister had listened and let her die in lieu of giving up the secret of the last Infinity Stone.

"That's..." His eyes didn't leave her as he finished reaching for the circuit board he had been aiming for and dragged it close. "That's not how-... I'm sorry."

She didn't ask what, exactly, he was sorry for. It didn't matter. Favorite children couldn't understand what it was like to be worth so little as to be jealous of the very dead they mourned. She had always envied her sister the life she had lived of unrealized ease, and now she envied her sister's death and escape from this endless torment. Even their father's attention, which, as bitter and painful as it was, was so often offered to her as a second-hand matter. All of these things now stood behind doors which had been slammed closed in her face.

-x-

"My sister was sick one time."

The Terran looked up from the mess of circuitry and stripped wires on the table in front of him.

She didn't know what had brought on this memory so suddenly. It was faded and muddled, having been rewritten through several modifications to her brain, but it crept through the silence around them as she worked on reassembling a long-since disabled Pylian Bomb and made itself at home in the front of her mind.

"It was before we had graduated into solo work, and she was supposed to accompany our father on a trip to the planet Arturax. When it became obvious she was unfit for travel, he allowed me to accompany him instead." She lowered the corner of casing she had been lining up and ran her thumb across it to wipe some imaginary spec of dust off. "I was so proud to stand at my father's side. Gamora was indisposed and the Black Order was busy elsewhere. I was his right hand, with no one to share him. No one to stand between us."

Something was squeezing her chest, constricting her heart and lungs so that it burned to breath.

"We had come there to deal with an insurgence in his army. Some radical group which was causing trouble among the ranks. It was a trap. The radicals had arranged a pair of their own to assassinate my father. He could have dealt with it on his own, but I was so desperate to prove my worth I dove forward to engage them myself without his orders."

"How old were you?" Tony took advantage of a small lull in her voice as she lost herself in her recollection to ask a question.

Without meeting his eyes she released the tech with one hand to indicate a height about two-thirds of the height she stood now.

"I won," she whispered, a note of pride rearing its head in her proclamation. "But I was severely damaged. My father had me suffer my injuries untreated for one cycle as he dealt with his army, as punishment for acting without waiting for his orders. While my father worked over me the next night, however, he praised my savagery in how I had met my enemies, and my devotion to him. It was the only time he ever praised me like that. I was so happy to hear those words, spoken to me, just to me. That was my favorite memory as a child."

A tremor was running through her arms, making it nearly impossible to line up the casing properly to fit it back into place. The harder she tried to will it away, the stronger it became.

The Terran's hand slid slowly across the table and into her strangely tunneled vision, hesitating just next to her own hand like it had once before. She pretended not to see it and tried again to force the panel back into place. Again it failed, and again after that. Visions of the cell she had spent the night in, bleeding out and so certain she would not survive long enough to be fixed, but desperate not to disappoint her father twice in one cycle, darted across her mind like startled orlani, intermingled with her father's rumbling voice as he soothed the pain away. The pain he had left her in to begin with.

The casing slipped from her hand when she gave it an especially violent twist and it clattered across the table, out of her reach. She stared down at her trembling fingers, and the Terran's hand, steady and calm and waiting patiently in stark contrast to her own. Slowly, she slid her empty hand over, and he rolled his hand so his empty palm lay upright. Her hand hovered over his for several painful breaths, half expecting that as soon as she took it he would snatch his hand away and mock her for her weakness. It was only right, she shouldn't be so weak, she was stronger than this. If she wasn't, then she didn't deserve this kindness. She hadn't earned it. It wasn't hers to accept.

Her chest burned with each slow and shallow breath, making each moment stretch a thousand times its length until the waiting became worse than whatever reality had in store. Accepting whatever pain was to come from this, she lowered her hand into his. He didn't jerk away, nor did he open his mouth to mock her weak decision. His hand curled around hers softly, and his other hand slid across the table to rest against her forearm. His grip was warm and reassuring against the skin of her right arm, but loose enough that she was certain she could change her mind and take her hand back at any time.

They sat in silence after that. No words came from the Terran's mouth. He just held her arm steady until the trembling stopped and she took it back.

**End Chapter 7**

**Chapter 8 Preview:**  "... _You have only made one point so far," she informed him. "I only need one more to win. It is not likely you will succeed."_

_She flicked the triangle, perhaps a little too quickly, and it fell short before his hands. "You could try though."_

_The corners of his lips twitched upwards as he gathered the piece of trash_..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't actually have a clue if her left had feels temperature or not. It's just my head canon, since really all of her is so tech'ed out it seemed reasonable enough she could to some degree at least. Her other arm appears more real, being still covered in skin, but I'm not even that sure if she has enough real flesh left would bleed to a significant degree if she suffered a severe injury at this point. The poor girl. This chapter in general spiraled a little more down than I was planning. I was trying to make Gamora come up since someone had asked about her. I kind of failed in that intent. xD They don't listen to me too well.
> 
> And I should probably stop bouncing back and forth between my stories so much. Nebula is so much further along in her growth in the other one it's harder to keep them separated. lol.
> 
> Anyways, probably just a handful of chapters more in space and I can get them back to Earth. I do intend to continue on to the final battle. Lately I've been toying with the idea of making a sort of sequal to this once I've caught up with Canon, an 'alternate ending' and continuation from there with Tony surviving the end. I'd make it as a separate document so one can remain canon compliant.
> 
> Thank you for the support and continuing to read!
> 
> -OMaM


	8. Now Close Your Eyes

**Chapter 8: Now Close Your Eyes**

Tony frowned as he lined up his next shot with an exaggerated amount of care, leaning his head low against the table and closing one eye. The effect was rather comical. When he flicked the foil triangle it flew wildly off to the side.

"Ugh," he groaned as he sat back up. "I don't think I'm winning this round."

Nebula leaned from her chair to retrieve the 'ball' and line it up again on her side. It had become somewhat of a ritual to play this game once a cycle, usually after the second meal and before Tony's second time on the table. This cycle his shots were flying wide more often than usual.

"You have only made one point so far," she informed him. "I only need one more to win. It is not likely you will succeed."

She flicked the triangle, perhaps a little too quickly, and it fell short before his hands. "You could try though."

The corners of his lips twitched upwards as he gathered the piece of trash.

"Thanks."

"For what?"

He just gave her the briefest of knowing smiles then returned his attention to the game. The next shot made it, and several rounds later they ended the game two to five.

-x-

"Do you know how to cook?" Tony was swirling a bag of rations around in his hand, taking his time choosing the best piece. "Like lasagna or spaghetti or whatever the space equivalent of a nice holiday meal is?"

"No," Nebula answered from where she sat across the table, leaning her head in one hand while she watched the Terran go about playing with his food.

"Really?" He didn't look up from the bag, but his eyebrows rose. "You strike me as the kind of person who doesn't cook often, but can actually make something amazing if you want to."

"I have never had the need to. My meals are provided, or stolen, or occasionally I have roasted something over flame."

Finally a suitable piece was chosen and Tony popped it into his mouth, mumbling out his next words around a bite of food. "Ah. I never learned to cook growing up either. Takeout and fast food built this body."

She had nothing to say to that and let the ship lapse back into silence while she closed her eyes. Another fuse had gone out the night before, and it had taken her most of the night and morning cycle to rewire a bypass so it didn't blow the entire system. The Terran had helped for a while, but it was getting increasingly difficult for him to stay awake for long periods, and he had overexerted himself.

"Your turn."

The Terran's voice startled her awake again, followed by the crinkling bag being shoved into her arms. She resisted the urge to fling it back at him in annoyance, settling for shoving it away so she could close her eyes again.

She fell asleep at the table not long after that, and awoke some time later with her head pillowed on her arms. The Terran was on the floor, tinkering away at some open panel of lifeless engine that she was pretty sure he'd been through before.

She must have made some noise when she woke because a moment later he began speaking over his shoulder without looking up. "Pepper can cook like a goddess. She almost never cooks, too busy keeping the world spinning, but sometimes she makes us special meals."

Had he been holding onto this conversation the whole time? Nebula blinked the sleep from her eyes and leaned back from the table to stretch her limbs. It had been a fairly long time, according to the internal clock tick-tick-ticking away endlessly inside of her, but he continued on like they hadn't missed a beat.

"Don't tell her, but I've actually been sneaking around behind her back and taking cooking classes. I've been paying in cash and told her I was doing community service on Thursdays. That was actually a terrible idea, it turns out. She wanted to join me. I missed three lessons and spent them reading to kids at a library so she wouldn't find out. The kids were pretty cool, though. They didn't rat me out at least. I'm learning to cook her favorite meal, including dessert. It's going to be a surprise for her birthday."

It was a wonder he could talk for so long with such sparse oxygen.

"How do you guys celebrate birthdays in space?"

"What's a birthday?" She mumbled thoughtlessly as she debated the options of finding something to do or relocating to a more vertical surface to continue her rest. The less they did, the longer they could stretch their rapidly dwindling supplies.

A bang dragged her a little further into wakefulness when the Terran dropped the metal tubing in his hand and spun around on the floor to stare at her. "I sincerely hope your translator is on the fritz, because you  _can't_  tell me they don't celebrate birthdays in space?"

She just blinked back at him, certain that her translator was fine.

There was a stricken look on his face now, as he tugged the blanket a little tighter around his shoulders. "A birthday, as in the day you were born? On Earth, we celebrate the anniversary of that day with stuff like cake, and presents, and a general sorta, merrymaking."

Nebula gave a snort and leaned forward again to pillow her head on her arms. "That's an idiotic thing to celebrate." Terra was such a strange place. Did they really have nothing better to do there?

"No, it's great. It's like all your friends and family get together and just enjoy the day, throw a big party, to celebrate... Here, look, when were you born? Like, I was born May 29th, and you were...?"

A part of her wanted to just close her eyes and fall back to sleep. To let him keep his stories to himself for once. She was tired of hearing them, tired of empty promises, and tired of playing pretend that either of them would ever see anything again but the inside of this shabby, broken shuttle.

She was tired.

But the last fuse was bound to break any moment, and there was almost no food left. They were nearly out of time, the Terran more so than her. In his own way he'd been struggling to keep her spirits up since the beginning. A largely futile, and strange sort of gesture she wasn't accustomed to, but she found she couldn't bring herself to so casually crush his spirit in return. So she took a slow breath and braced herself for a different sort of emptiness than the one in her stomach and gave him his answer. "I don't know."

His immediate response was a predictable wave of confusion and his smile fell. The wrinkles on his forehead deepened as his brows lowered before they suddenly shot back up, his earlier smile returning as quickly as it had vanished, if a little wobbly now. "Oh, right. Spaceships probably don't run on Earth months." Tony drummed his fingers against the floor and bit his lip. "I don't know how the calendar system out here works, but we can calculate an approximation in Earth years. We have plenty of time to spare."

"No," she murmured, and his brows lowered again, like he already knew what she was going to say. "I mean I don't remember." Perhaps she shouldn't have bothered. It seemed she had crushed his spirit after all.

Tony opened his mouth then seemed to think better of whatever he was going to say and closed it again. He repeated this a couple more times before finally settling on something to say. "That's fine. Not everyone remembers or celebrates their real birthday on Earth either. We can make one up for you. Like, we can celebrate the anniversary of when we get to Earth? Surviving a long hopeless trek through space seems celebration worthy."

Nebula wrinkled her nose. If they somehow made it through it would be a feat of luck, not their own efforts or ingenuity that saved them at this point. That did seem fitting enough for a ritual meant to celebrate something as inane and out of one's individual control as being born.

"If you don't like that, you could share mine." He spread his arms wide and added, "Welcome to team Gemini!"

"No thanks."

"We'll figure something out," he promised merrily, ignoring her clear lack of enthusiasm as he heaved himself to his feet. His socked feet muffled his steps as he stumbled over to grab something off a nearby shelf, tucking it under his blanket and returning to stand across the table.

"Here." He produced the folded up leather jacket that he had been using as a pillow during his treatments and placed it on the table in front of her. "Get some more shuteye. I'll hold down the fort. Quietly, I promise."

While he returned to his project on the floor she gave him a loud snort and ignored the jacket to tuck her face deeper into her crossed arms. He didn't so much as glance back as he settled back down and eventually she reached out and dragged the offered pillow over buffer her skin against the hard table surface. The worn leather reeked of sweat and beer and very, very faintly, of her sister.

**End**

**Chapter 9 Preview : **"... _His eyes were getting misty again and his words were growing slower. She hoped he might nod off while recounting these tales and forget he had asked her a question._

_"So? Your turn."_

_No such luck it seemed_..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry! Life's been wild. I got offered a job I've been wanting, but it was kinda last minute, so now I'm scrambling to get everything ready at my current place for me to leave and getting all my paperwork and testing done for the new place. Super excited! But also super busy. Also, I found out I'll be getting to go to Fanime after all, which I wasn't sure I'd be going to this year. So lots of packing for that. I could really use the vacation, but it falls right in the middle of chaos, lol. I might get one more update between now and when I leave, since the next chapter is pretty much half-written already, but we'll see.
> 
> I still have plenty of things I want to do with this story, and don't plan to stop, but I'm afraid updates may be a little slower for a couple weeks. :)
> 
> -OMaM


	9. It's Getting Dark and the Highway's Clear

**Chapter 9: It's Getting Dark and the Highway's Clear**

"I miss my bed," Tony sighed. The co-pilot's chair creaked and groaned as he wriggled around again, as if there was any position he hadn't tried yet. "Are you sure this thing doesn't recline any further?"

Nebula didn't bother answering him as he tugged for the thousandth time at the lever that controlled the angle of the backrest. He already knew it didn't go any further. And her suggestions to go find a more suitable sleeping place were always met with the same half-hearted excuses about enjoying the stars. She had the sense he didn't like the tight dark sleeping pods that were common to save space on smaller vessels. Those more accustomed to planetary life often equated them to coffins or being buried alive.

Eventually he gave up and collapsed back onto his chair with a deep huff. "How is your back not killing you? Because my spine is about ready to crawl right out and abandon ship."

She pursed her lips at the crude description. "My enhancements keep everything in alignment. It doesn't matter where I sleep."

"Oh really?" His eyebrows raised up as he turned his head to stare at her with renewed interest. "What's the weirdest place you've ever slept?" Here he rolled over and settled as comfortably as he could onto his side, tucking one arm under his head as a pillow. "You're some sort of assassin right, you must have slept in some strange places. I've found Natasha and Clint asleep in the vents of our building plenty of times. Clint dragged an entire inflatable mattress and minifridge in there. I told him if he blocked the air system or made the building smell like grilled cheese again I'd call Pest Control and let them deal with it.

"I'll even go first," he offered. "Let's see... I probably have a list a mile long, including a giant doughnut and the catwalk backstage of a terrible play, and now a spaceship drifting the empty cosmos, but the worst wierd place I ever fell asleep would probably be on a steel support beam of Stark Towers while it was under repairs. I went up there to hide from Happy while I patched up some damage to my suit- I didn't want another lecture if he ratted me out to Pepper- and just kinda... nodded off in the middle of fixing it. I got in trouble anyways. Some idiot with a telescopic camera took a couple of photos and it was in the news by the time I woke up. There was even speculation in a bad tabloid that I was dead. The Fire department was called on me, too. It was their sirens that woke me up. I didn't just get a lecture. Pepper, well, she had enough time to prepare an entire powerpoint for me."

His eyes were getting misty again and his words were growing slower. She hoped he might nod off while recounting these tales and forget he had asked her a question.

"So? Your turn."

No such luck it seemed.

Things lapsed into silence for a long beat, as she searched for a memory that might satisfy the Terran's curiosity. One that she was willing to share, at least.

"In the air vents of a freight cruiser while it was traveling through its rout. I was waiting for a target to board so I could extract information."

"Okay, you're just cheating and copying off my homework here. You must have fallen asleep somewhere worse than that."

She blew out a huff of breath through her nose, and started over with a new story. An older one. "On the ice fields of a planet called Yavneet. Gamora, Korath and I were in pursuit of a lead for the location of one of the Infinity Stones. These missions were more of a race for our father's favor than... collaborative efforts. Korath managed to entrap Gamora and I in a cave-in. During the collapse I was damaged. A block of ice struck my skull hard enough to affect my brain and even the enhancement within it. I fell asleep shortly after while the nanobots in my blood worked to repair the damage. By the time I woke up, Gamora had dug her way to freedom, but when she left she had taken my boots with her."

"She took your shoes?"

"Yes. So I couldn't pursue her or continue with the mission. She could cut her competition in half. The ice fields weren't just a solid desert of ice, it was filled with broken shards and jagged pathways. My modifications might prevent me from freezing, and protect my feet from the worst of the ice's effects long enough to return to extraction, but the ice would slice them to ribbons. There was a good chance I would bleed out and die before I made it back, and it would be agony until then."

The starlight and the plate in his chest cast strange shadows and made it hard to read his expression as he watched her raptly from his chair. "Did she come back for you?" he asked.

"Thanos makes no allowances for those who cannot take care of themselves. He expected as much from us. I remained in the cave for nearly three cycles, but when no other option presented itself, I tore part of my suit into strips and forced my way back to the extraction point where I could summon a flight. It was little protection, but the strips soaked the blood and froze and I did not bleed out before I made my destination. Still, my father was greatly disturbed by my show of weakness. It took me three cycles to return, so I spent three cycles on the table in pieces while he remedied issue. It was his idea of poetic justice. Our punishments were always fit to our crimes."

The Terran was frowning now, his eyebrows melting into the dark shadows of his sunken eyes in an expression she didn't think she had seen before. It was something dark and almost dangerous, the undercurrent of humor conspicuously absent. "Yeah, no," he said suddenly. He was still frowning, but it was like the layer of darkness had been shaken and he was back to his ceaselessly happy self. "That doesn't count. You were clearly knocked unconscious when we were talking about like, taking a nap with some poor timing or bad decision making involved. If we were talking about injuries or kidnapping I'd have to change my answer."

She watched his rambling through lowered brows of her own, not sure what to make of the sudden shift and back again of his mood. He was covering for something besides fear or pity this time. Whatever it was, if he wasn't going to bring it up, she wouldn't either.

"We'll go again if you're up for it. I'll tell you about the time I fell asleep on a park bench and woke up covered in bird seed and pigeons."

-x-

"This is the last time," she announced as she set the Suturim aside. "The infection has receded. You can take care of it from here."

Tony sat up on the table and prodded at the wound which was finally healing properly, the dark veins and blooming red all but vanished without a trace.

"Well that's good news for a change."

If he wanted to consider it good news that he would live long enough to die of dehydration or oxygen deprivation. Whichever supply gave out first.

"I don't think it's even going to scar that bad," he mused out loud as she tucked away the supplies for the last time. "Kind of a shame. Pepper's going to wring my neck when I get back, I could use a bit of pity to buy me some time. She usually waits until I'm back on my feet to kick my ass... If she has to wait long enough, I can get out of the worst of it."

Nebula just rolled her eyes at his cowardice.

"I feel like we should celebrate," he continued as he tugged his shirt back down and pushed himself off the table. He miscalculated his strength and immediately had to grab a nearby chair for support, but his somewhat crooked smile remained fixed in place.

"Usually when I get out hospitals I go out for cheeseburgers, but we can break from tradition here." He stumbled over to the small shelf where they had been storing the remaining and swiftly dwindling supplies. "How does... mysterious, suspiciously off-colored, some-sort-of-jerky sound? I was saving it for last, but life is short, right?"

"It'll be shorter if we use up supplies needlessly," she warned.

"It'll be dinner time in like an hour anyways," he countered, a sadness misting over his eyes even as his lips smiled on at the bag held in one slightly shaking hand. "Come on. An early dinner. No real waste, and just this once."

"Just this once?" she pressed, not sure she believed him.

He stared at the shelf that was nearly empty for a long moment, the corners of his lips wavering as the sadness bled from his eyes and spread into his smile. "Just this once."

-x-

The last fuse to the Atmosphere Control Unit blew the next cycle. With its death came another dimming of the emergency lights. It was like a tortuously slow descent into death, one reluctant dragging step at a time.

"Hey Space-girl?" Tony asked from where he lay across several chairs, staring up at the shadows on the ceiling. "I have another question for you."

"Just one?" Nebula was laying on her back on the table, her arm covering her eyes from the last faint light, and facing the other direction so that her head was nearer his boots. Their bodies were both adjusting again to the lowered oxygen. It was a grueling process, and not growing easier with each time.

"Why did you wait three days before going back?"

That made her lift her arm blink her eyes open, though she couldn't see the Terran's face from where she was right then. "What?"

"On that planet; the frozen one. You said no one would ever come to save you, but you still waited three days to leave that cave, when you could have left the first day and been stronger. I was just wondering why."

She closed her eyes again and draped her arm back over her eyes. That wasn't what she wanted to think about right now. "I was just delaying the inevitable. Like a coward."

A short bought of coughing came from the row of chairs below.

"Nah," he rasped out when he finally caught his breath again, "I don't think that was it. You're not a coward."

Nebula let out a long breath and focused on regulating her own breathing. "You don't know what I am."

"I could hazard a guess. When you're trapped in a box drifting through empty space with someone, you get to know them pretty well, and I think I figured you out, Space-girl."

She would have rolled her eyes had she had the energy.

"You're a dreamer, Nebula."

"The low oxygen is affecting your brain. Go to sleep."

"No, I'm sure of it."

She could hear the smile in his voice now.

"That's why you waited three days to see if anyone would come. That's why you came back for me on Titan even though I was just a dying stranger, and you've worked so hard to take care of me, when you could have left me behind or let me die and kept the supplies for yourself."

"You have no idea who I've been or what I've done," she growled, dropping her arm down to the table so she could glare in his direction.

The chairs creaked as he likely shrugged against them. "I don't need to. I know you who you are and what you do now. People like you and me, no matter how bad or hopeless it gets, we just keep going, just in case it gets better. We can't help ourselves."

"I keep going because there is no other option."

"Not for us." A hand reached up onto the table and patted at her ankle. "...That's your leg isn't it?" He sighed and dropped his hand back down out of sight. "So how long do you think we have?"

She closed her eyes again and pretended to think about it. Like she didn't know the calculations by heart by now.

"You have four, maybe five cycles before your body won't be able to maintain consciousness anymore."

"What about you?" His voice was hushed.

"My modifications will buy me more time," she told him, squeezing her eyes further as though she could block out the image of the inevitable. "They will keep me conscious and functioning for as long as they can, shutting off one non-vital function at a time, and then moving on to more permanent losses." Unlike the Terran she would not be allowed to simply fall asleep. And through the worst of it, she would have only a corpse for company.

The chairs clanked and rattled as the Terran gracelessly dragged himself up and turned around so that they were both laying the same direction. Once he had settled back down, a hand reappeared over the edge of the table, tapping the surface and waving at her until she shoved her arm over, allowing it to hang over the edge so that the Terran could intertwine his fingers with hers. His pulse was frantic and shallow as his lungs struggled to draw in enough oxygen.

"Thanks," he whispered. "for saving me."

"No one has been saved." There was nowhere left to go from here but down.

He gave her hand a weak squeeze.

"Hey, we can dream, right? There's still tomorrow, and a few more days after that."

**End**

**Chapter 10 Preview:**  "... _Those seven. With the dwarf star in the center. I suppose they vaguely resemble an Arvian Field Hound, mid-track."_

 _The Terran nodded knowingly, though she doubted he had any knowledge of what such a thing was_..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last update before I go on vacation! Finished most of my packing and thought I'd celebrate by finishing this up real quick and posting it before I went.
> 
> Full disclosure, the memory from the ice fields has some ulterior motives behind it. Those of you who are here from my main fic may remember a scene from "Unfinished Business" in which Nebula takes Gamora's shoes. I was planning to circle back to this memory (and a couple other minor points involving Korath) to explain it in the next couple of chapters, it was just a kind of sibling inside joke among the two and Korath like 'I've won and you're going nowhere', but when I wound up changing my mind about and completely redoing the next arc the explanation kind of got lost in the shuffle. I still intend to bring it up eventually, but in the mean time it's like this half a joke that never got finished. Just haunting me. My only real rule when I started writing Astro was that I couldn't go back and change things that were already posted (besides spelling and grammar.) to keep myself from spending all my time going back, and it just seemed mean to the readers to do that. Someone I was talking to asked about it the other day, though, so I figured I'd sneak it in here for the time being.
> 
> Thank you for continuing to read and thank you for the comments! I'll get to replies as soon as I can!
> 
> For the person who mentioned Tony throwing a birthday party for Nebula, I have plans. Don't you worry! And also some drawings on my art tumblr of such a thing. xD [ Caffeineandconceptart]
> 
> Not too far away now from their rescue and return to Earth!
> 
> Sorry for the rambling, have a great week everyone!
> 
> -OMaM


	10. No Sign of Life from Front to Rear

**Chapter 10: No Sign of Life from Front to Rear**

"That one looks like an ice cream cone." Tony pointed at a patch of stars off to the left. "Don't you think so?"

"I wouldn't know."

"It does," he assured her with a sharp nod. "The kind you get from a soft serve machine. You go next."

Nebula scanned the galaxies beyond the windshield and picked out her own handful of stars. "Those seven. With the dwarf star in the center. I suppose they vaguely resemble an Arvian Field Hound, mid-track."

The Terran nodded knowingly, though she doubted he had any knowledge of what such a thing was.

"Okay, my turn. Let's see..." One hand came up to scratch at his scraggly beard as he made a show of picking his next set of stars. The cool blue plate highlighted his labored breathing as his chest rose and fell to an unsteady beat.

"I see a turtle on a skateboard." A small chuckle. "He's headed for the ice cream cone."

It was back to her, and she took her time scanning the field of vision for some imaginary shape in the stars. This game, at least, had some measure of sense behind it, and even a distant sense of familiarity that was, for once, not entirely painful. Nearly all planets had some form of archaic star-charts which relied on relating the cosmos into images of beasts or plants or stories for the natives to use in their travels before the stars themselves became open to them.

She was more accustomed to learning them by numbers and clusters in a more universal mapping system of the galaxies, but when they had been very young, Korath had once taught Gamora and Nebula the ancient names to the constellations of the Kree planet he had grown up on.

He had been not quite an adult, limbs too gangly and with a patchy beard that had refused to grow in with any grace, but much too tall and sharply angled to be considered a youth anymore. Nebula recalled keenly, even now through the haze of time, how he had towered over the sisters as he stared up at the night sky, his breath billowing out like smoke in the frozen air and his dark eyes lit up like diamonds.

They had been set on guard, standing watch over a great doorway which their father had vanished into what seemed like ages before in the remnants of her childish memory. Some sort of meeting or other such mundanity of war that happened to take place on Korath's homeworld, from before he had sworn his allegiance to Thanos and earned himself the title of 'Pursuer.' Their newest older brother had sought to alleviate some of the boredom through reminiscing. It was a strangely soft moment they had all shared under the cosmos who's names she could no longer recall, a brief ebb in the violence that made up their lives. The next morning Korath, nearly twice their size, would fracture two of Gamora's ribs and break Nebula's wrist in a training exercise.

"It is a Class Seven Cannon Vessel." She finally picked her next image, lifting one strangely heavy arm to point at a new set of stars. "The cannon is deployed and ready to fire."

Tony twitched and dragged his eyes open. He must have begun drifting off while she had lost herself in thought. "What's it firing at?" he croaked out, squinting like he was searching for the image he had no way of identifying.

"No," she refused, settling her arm back down across her stomach. "It's your turn. I will find its target next time."

From his seat, the Terran stuck his tongue out at her. "It better not be firing at my ice cream cone," he muttered under his breath, his eyes fluttering closed again. It seemed their newest pastime was over. She was almost sad to see it end, and if she let her eyes drift back to the empty void around them and trace the outline of another imaginary constellation... well, no one would ever know.

-x-

The Terran let out a deep gusty sigh as he dropped down to sit next to her on the short step-down between the common room and flight deck.

"This is it, huh?" In his hand he held the final bag of rations, already half empty from the last time they had eaten. "Last meal."

"Yes," she confirmed needlessly.

He tilted the opening toward himself and took a sniff as though he didn't already know exactly what it was. "Death row inmates get better last meals than this," he grumbled, wrinkling his nose and making a show of his distaste.

Nebula let out a weak breath of laughter at the rather accurate comparison, even as the Terran's reference seemed incongruous with everything else she had learned about his home planet. After all his wistful stories and misty-eyed tales of 'birthday parties' and 'vacations,' it was almost a relief to find that, in truth, Terra was just as dark and tainted as the rest of the universe. It was like a missing piece clicked into place, and reality made sense again.

Beautiful gardens grew from rotten things, and promises were just lies planned a head of time.

It was a rare treat, really, to learn the thing so far beyond her reach was worthless anyways. Some reasonable part of her acknowledged that she was being unfair, and pettiness was a flimsy wall to erect between herself and the greater issues here, but it was a wall nonetheless. And like a coward, she hid behind it.

The crinkle of a bag being shoved against her elbow drew her from her thoughts. The Terran was staring at her expectantly through sunken, bloodstained eyes. The shadows cast from the ever-present glow on his chest exaggerated the hollow valleys under his cheekbones, and gave him the appearance of a corpse already. Wordlessly, she placed her hand on the bag of rations and shoved them back towards the dying man, catching his eye with her own and daring him to argue with her. In a moment of rare and surprising wisdom, he didn't.

When the last bite had been swallowed, he carefully folded the wrapper into a triangle.

"One more round?" he offered, holding the familiar shape up. "I'm feeling lucky."

-x-

"Hey Space-girl," Tony's voice, muffled with exhaustion and hunger woke her from her half-slumber in the pilot's chair. "Can I ask you a favor?"

One eye cracked open in silent answer. The Terran was leaning against the co-pilot's chair, his blanket drawn tight and bunched up in nervous fingers. A strangely serious look had settled across his face, so she roused herself a little more and blinked open both eyes. "What is it?"

It had been nearly a complete cycle since his last meal, and he swayed a bit where he stood, even with the backrest for support. Under one of his arms, peeking out from underneath the blanket was the mangled face of his helmet. "If I-" he started, then stopped, dropping his eyes to the floor as though searching the dirty panels for the words he wanted. She was fairly certain what he was going to ask, but she said nothing, waiting him out. "If help comes and it's... too late for me, would you make sure this gets to Pepper?"

With some wobbling, he managed to produce the helmet from under the folds of his blanket and hold it up for Nebula to see, his head still ducked towards the floor, in desperation or defeat she didn't know.

"No," she said flatly, closing her eyes and returning to the rest he'd disturbed.

"No?" The Terran echoed, his voice suddenly stronger than it had been a moment before and laced with something between anger and disbelief. "What do you mean ' _no_ '?"

"No one is coming to save us." She kept her eyes closed, but her traitorous mind summoned up the image of what he must look like -hurt, shocked, betrayed,  _angry_ \- for her to see anyways. "I can't do that."

She could hear the sharp intake of his breath, and the rustling of his clothes as he drew the helmet closer again. If she opened her eyes, she would probably see his knuckles going white from gripping it so hard. As she had predicted, he didn't like her answer. He was upset, she was certain, but she didn't care. She could handle him, even in her weakened state.

"You don't know that," he said slowly, his voice growing quiet again. He must be looking down at the helmet.

The breath she took next was long, and she made a show of her exasperation as she heaved it back out through her nose. She had accepted her fate a long time ago. Before they'd run out of food and water. Before the batteries on this hunk of scrap gave out. Before even Titan. But every time she had made some measure of peace with it, the Terran seemed hell-bent on dangling the notion of survival in her face all over again. It was painful, and cruel, and she was tired of enabling his nonsense.

"Come on," he tried. He sounded disappointed. She ignored the stirring of guilt in her chest. That was just what he was counting on. Did he think she was that stupid? If she opened her eyes, she would surely see the anger he couldn't hide from his eyes. "I'm not asking for anything big here, just a promise to try."

"No."

A rustling and soft thunk filled the cabin as he dropped heavily into the chair next to her. "Can I at least know why?"

To be honest, she wasn't entirely sure. It wasn't like she hadn't made promises she never intended to keep before. So many of them, in fact, she didn't even bother to keep tract. Promises of mercy, or survival, leverage to get the information she needed, broken as easily as they had been made. So why she was suddenly so unwilling to do the same for the Terran eluded her.

It was the Terran's turn to draw in a long breath when it became apparent she had nothing more to say. In the silence that followed her skin crawled in anticipation of what was to follow. Her eyes were still closed, and she reclined on her chosen chair with carefully feigned nonchalance, even as she listened for any signs of the retaliation to come her way. Surely, he wouldn't be stupid enough to think he could take her on in a physical brawl, even with the supposed element of surprise. At the least he would shout, though, perhaps try to cut her with some sharp word. He knew enough about her to think himself dangerous at this point. More than perhaps anyone else ever had known about her, and it  _did_  make him dangerous. She had only her own stupid self to blame for that.

When the silence stretched for too long, she cracked one suspicious eye open. Instead of glaring at her, though, or doing any of the dozen or so things she may have been expecting, the Terran was hunched miserably in his seat, staring down at the mask cradled in his lap, and turned somewhat away from her. The image in her mind of the anger on his face and hidden behind his voice crumbled away, like a rug yanked out from under her feet, and she was left momentarily off-balanced. All of her own fury which she had gathered in defense against whatever punishment he was going to send her way suddenly had no target to meet, and like a violent wave with nothing to crash against, it rolled on aimlessly until it ran out of steam and simply dispersed back into the silent sea, leaving her hollow and lost, and strangely unharmed.

-x-

"What are you doing?"

The Terran paused, the pen held mid-stroke over the upturned helmet he had placed on the table. His hollow eyes rose to watch her where she leaned with her arms crossed on the archway between the common room and flight deck for a quiet moment before returning to his work.

"I'm writing a message, so if someone finds this they might return it to Earth."

Nebula stepped closer to the table, leaning over it to glance at the markings he had made. "No one will be able to read that," she informed him. "And no junker is going to bother translating it."

Tony frowned and tugged the helmet closer to himself. "What am I supposed to do?" he asked crossly. "Write it in binary?"

With a small sigh, she uncrossed her arms and dropped down into the seat across from him, holding her hand out for the pen. "I can show you how to write it in common," she elaborated, when he just stared at her hand and gripped his items tighter, as though afraid she might take them from him.

At her explanation, the hesitation dropped from his face and he quickly shoved the pen into her open hand. The helmet made a soft scraping noise as he shoved that over as well, and leaned in. The heavy exhaustion was replaced with curiosity and more life than she had seen in his eyes for cycles.

"If found, return to Pepper Potts of the planet Earth- Terra, I guess you call it- and maybe some mention of reward couldn't hurt..."

The likelihood of anyone caring enough to find the message in the helmet, let alone following through with the vague request, was practically nonexistant, but she kept that to herself as she added a translation of his words in neat and precise common under the scribbled mess he had already made.

"Thanks," he murmured as he took the piece of half-melted tech back, studying the foreign letters through narrowed eyes as though hoping to discern their meaning for a long moment before turning back to her. "Did you want to leave a message for anyone?"

"I have no one to leave a message for."

The Terran bit the corner of his lip and looked down. "Oh," he muttered. "Right. Sorry, about your friends here."

"They weren't mine," she reminded him idly as she capped the pen they'd been using. A small spot of greasy ink smeared onto her finger and she frowned as she rubbed at it. Her having no one to leave a message for had nothing to do with Thanos's most recent list of mortalities, but there was no need to waste their precious oxygen on telling him that.

The resulting silence went unbroken while she worked to clean the ink from her hand. The more she wiped at it, though, the more it seemed to smear into her skin until she surrendered her attempts, dropping her hands back to the table with the clink of fingernails and metal against metal.

The Terran, who had been staring intently at the eyes of his helmet jumped as though startled from sleep.

"Well," Tony said, rolling the helmet back over so she could see the inside and pointing at where a long bubbling crack ran through a series of switches and buttons. At least half of them appeared to be beyond function. "If you change your mind, this button here is how you record. Just press it once to start, and a blue light will come on. Then press it again to end the recording." He moved his finger, trembling faintly as though the effort of simply being awake for so long was growing to be too much. "And this one here, that's how you play back old messages. It sticks a little, so you have to try a few times, but it works, I promise."

With that said, he stood, tugging the blanket tight around his shoulders and hobbled off towards the flight deck, likely to take another nap underneath the stars, leaving the helmet behind to stare at her with its cold, empty eyes.

"Just in case you miss the sound of my voice."

**End**

**Chapter 11 Preview:  **"... _she turned her attention to find Tony slumped into one of the chairs by the table. One arm was slung over the backrest, as though it was the only thing holding him up, and it almost looked like he was panting. His usual blanket was conspicuously absent, and the worry drifted through the muddle of thoughts filling her addled brain that his fever had returned._

 _When he caught her eyes, his face twisted into a guilty frown_..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Raises up from the grave of exhaustion that is working 7 days a week* I LIIIIIIIIVE!
> 
> Hey there! Sorry about the extra long hiatus! Things have been... busy and exhausting. But they're settling back down now. I'm almost completely done with the first job, and I'm getting into the swing of my new one, and getting into better shape so I'm not so beat when I get home. I'm loving it so far!
> 
> The next chapter should not take nearly as long as this one did. I don't really have a regular writing routine back yet, but I'm getting there, and I have a pretty clear idea of what's happening, just need to write it. I've been playing a little intentionally vague with the passage of time in the last few chapters just so I could mosey on to other things. I am planning to have Carol show up in the next chapter, and then I can get into some heavy return to Earth stuff and all there is to unbox there.
> 
> Sorry if the writing's a little rough in some places as I get back into the habit, and I really hope the conversation about the promise came out okay. It was meant to be that Nebula was assuming he'd be mad, and was basically projecting her past experiences and expectations onto his part of the conversation, but when she finally actually looked at him she realized that the reality was different, and she didn't know what to do in an argument that didn't end in blows. It was a risk I took, and I hope it worked out.
> 
> Thank you for reading, and for the reviews!
> 
> And a special thanks for the patience!
> 
> -OMaM


	11. Is it Just You My Dear

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What's that phrase; It's always darkest before the dawn?
> 
> Not entirely true, but it makes for some nice cinema.
> 
> Enjoy!

**Chapter 11: Is it Just You My Dear?**

Nebula rolled the stripped wire thoughtfully between her fingers. It was a project she'd been working on for some time now. A futile sort of effort that had a great risk involved. It had been abandoned a good many times already for the fear that it would backfire spectacularly, and because, deep down, she already knew it wouldn't work. There was no functioning machinery left to worry about frying, though, and while the practical survivor in her was loath to risk burning up the last of their oxygen, the more resigned portion of her mind reasoned that a swifter death may prove a mercy at this point.

From the flight deck, she could hear the ragged breathing of the dying Terran as his body struggled for more oxygen even in his sleep. He had maybe one cycle left. It was a toss up if the low oxygen or lack of water would do him in first, the blood in his veins slowly turning into sludge until it was too thick for his heart to pump.

She could feel her own blood beginning to do the same. Or maybe it was just the lack of oxygen affecting her brain and weakening her heart. The same race for death that was claiming him was waging in her as well. It wouldn't really matter in the end, which one took them. They'd be dead all the same.

The panel in her forearm was propped open, one wire from the tangled mess of ship's guts already twisted into them as she selected the correct line for the one in her hands. Carefully, she stripped the insulation from the second wire , then shaped it in her hand until it formed a little hook. Couldn't have it falling off and blowing their only shot at this, the part of her that played along with this little charade of hope quipped.

It was going to hurt. There was no sense in lying to herself about that. It might even kill her. But the way she looked at it, she had nothing much to lose, and something to gain either way; A last desperate snatch into the darkness at hope, or a swift, merciful death. Either she would wake up, or there would be nothing worth waking up to anyways.

Tony's breathing drifted on through the air, steady in its rough uneven beat, and assuring her that he was asleep, and she would not be interrupted. With one last deep breath she attached the wire.

Pain hit like a brick wall, and then there was nothing.

-x-

Consciousness came back in sprigs of color and sparkles of pain, her cybernetic systems rebooted as her organic pieces stirred begrudgingly from the safe haven of the deepest sleep. There was the sense that she had been gone for quite some time, but her mind was too weary and scrambled to tell her for certain just yet. When she blinked the fizzling nothingness from her eyes it was to the all too familiar, and entirely unwelcome, sight of the dirty roof of the Benatar.

Everything was silent and dark. It hadn't worked. And it was just her luck that it hadn't even managed to fail spectacularly enough to be useful either. Just enough to land her back into the torturous purgatory where she had started. With a new pounding in her head.

Something moved off to her side, a rustle of jeans and creak of a cushion, and she slid her eyes over to find Tony slumped into one of the chairs by the table. One arm was slung over the backrest, as though it was the only thing holding him up, and his lips were parted slightly as he panted. His usual blanket was conspicuously absent, and the worry drifted through the muddle of thoughts filling her addled brain that his fever had returned.

When he caught her eyes, his face twisted into a guilty frown. "I couldn't get you to a bed," he confessed, "I'm sorry. It was all I could do..."

She narrowed her eyes back at him, not sure if she had missed some part of his conversation, but when she went to shift, she found something was draped on top of her. The Terran's blanket. And underneath her head, the leather jacket had been folded up.

"I tried to drag a mattress over here," he continued, voice labored, "but, they don't come off."

Of course they didn't. Any space traveler would know that. They would be nothing but a hazard flying around in turbulence or if the gravity failed.

"Sorry," he murmured again.

He had tried.

That was more than she had ever received before. More than she had ever dared to ask or expect in her life.

She didn't thank him as she forced her heavy limbs, still buzzing as though there was too much electricity dancing through her circuits and wires, to hold her weight. She didn't thank him as she gathered the blanket and the jacket that didn't smell like anything but a sweaty dying Terran anymore. And she didn't thank him as she passed the items back to the man at the table.

Wordlessly, however, she tugged his arm from where it clung to the back of his chair and slipped it over her shoulder so she could pull him to his feet and steady him as they made their way back to the flight deck. Back to the stars which he so rarely left as of late.

Tony slumped gracelessly into the co-pilot's chair, and her arms felt strangely cold without their burden.

"What were you trying to do?" he grunted out when she tried to slip away before he noticed.

She paused and eyed him over her shoulder.

"You were trying to power the ship with your own body, weren't you?" He looked like he wanted to accuse her, but was too tired to force the emotion into his voice.

"Just the life support," she told him. If she'd thought power would have made any difference to the rotten engines -melted beyond repair by the batteries as their final parting gifts- she would have tried long ago.

The Terran stared at the floor for several painful heartbeats. When his eyes rose to meet her again, they were filled with a desperation that caught her off-guard.

"Please don't leave me," he whispered.

She didn't know what to say to that; she was going to die soon enough -but not really  _soon_  enough- and there was nothing she could do to help it? Or that he was the one who was leaving her, and there was nothing she could do about that either?

Neither of these facts would bring him any comfort, and he already knew them anyways, no matter how hard he played at blind optimism.

Her legs were growing tired standing there, unwilling to hold the weight of her body for much longer. Slowly she lowered herself down into the pilot's chair to relieve them. The heavy weight which had settled in her soul remained.

Slowly, probably making it painfully obvious that she was not entirely certain that she was doing it right- because, to be honest, she wasn't- she reached across the empty space between them, holding her empty palm up.

With a smile that was as much pained as it was grateful, Tony reached out to take it. His hand was only barely any warmer than the air around them, and papery with dehydration, but she thought, just maybe, the heaviness in her soul may have grown lighter as some of the tension faded from his shoulders, and just a touch of the sadness faded from his eyes.

-x-

"How many days has it been now?" Tony asked. His voice drifted up from where he lay on his back on the floor of the flight deck so he could stare up at the stars through reddened eyes that couldn't seem to stay open for long.

"Twenty one and a half standard cycles," she answered automatically from her perch on the Pilot's chair, curled up so that her feet weren't shoved in his armpit.

Tony had draped several of the blankets across the two foremost seats, claiming the resulting structure as a 'fort.' When Nebula had refused to surrender her spot to lay on the floor with him, she had been designated instead as a weight, holding up one corner of the flimsy structure which had been draped over her own seat. The sheet wrinkled underneath her when she shifted, so she tried not to move too much.

"Three weeks," he breathed. The upper half of his body stuck out from under the draped blanket, his arms folded behind his head. "I'm going to have plenty of shows to catch up on when I get back. Do you watch T.V?"

"No." She wasn't entirely sure what he was referring to, the translators made generic terms a little tricky at times, but no seemed like the obvious answer.

He made a noise that was probably supposed to be a laugh, but his lungs lacked the capacity to do it properly right now. "Ah, it's the best. Or the worst. I mean, most shows are just.. eh, and some are... well they're bad. But when you find a really good one... I love binge watching dramas when I'm confined to resting up in my room or something..." His voice faded in and out, like he was drifting off to sleep even as his mouth kept moving. "Sometimes, when I'm stuck on bed rest too long, Pepper helps me build a fort, and we watch them together. You wouldn't guess it, but she's the best at building forts. A world title holder, really."

His voice was barely a whisper now.

"She'd be such an amazing mom."

A frown tugged at her lips, but the Terran wouldn't be able to see it. It was just babbling now, anyways. It was hardly surprising when a soft snoring began to rise up from the floor, a faint wheeze to it as his lungs failed to draw in enough proper air to allow him to even rest in peace.

The snoring came to a sudden jarring halt as he woke again. His brain was probably panicking at the lack of oxygen, but waking would do no good, there was no where to escape.

"Space-Girl?"

His voice was small in the vast silence as he called out to her.

"I'm still here."

The panicked breathing slowed back down to a more natural, but still obviously labored pace.

"I had a dream," he murmured, his babbling recommencing after letting the silence linger for only a beat. Perhaps he was afraid that if he fell asleep, it would be for the last time. The thought had certainly crossed her mind once or twice as of late. "It was... right before all of... all of  _this_. Before I left Earth..."

Another moment of silence followed by a shallow gasp as he drifted and startled awake again.

"I dreamed... dreamt? I think it's dreamt... I dreamed that Pepper and I, we had a kid."

One more pause, this one seemed intentional, but she allowed him to babble on without answering. She had no knowledge to offer on this subject anyways. Gamora might have had some wisdom to share. She, at least, had some memories of her own parents before they met their end at the hands of Thanos's army. But Gamora wasn't here. It was just her. And all she knew how to offer was silence, and the occasional assurance that she hadn't left yet.

"I thought maybe it was a sign... y'know? Like maybe... maybe it was time to settle down... start a different kind of life together... Just me an' Pepper... Living a life... we didn't have to share with the rest of the world."

I don't really have the kind of life you can bring a kid into, but I thought... maybe I  _could_? Live that kind of life I mean. It never sounded like it was for me before but... with Pepper, it sounded so good."

She thought, maybe, it sounded like he was crying.

There was a loud sniffle, and he lifted an arm to wipe at his face.

"Maybe it's for the best," he heaved out, his hand still covering his eyes. "I couldn't even keep a damned teenager with superpowers alive. I would just ruin their life like I ruin the lives of everyone else I come across. I-" His voice hitched like he wanted to sob but his body refused to provide the necessary moisture for tears. "I would be a terrible father... I-"

With a frown she slipped one leg over the edge of her seat and swung it in a lazy arc at the emotional Terran below. She'd been aiming for his arm but missed and clipped him in the chin instead.

Still, it worked. He startled and yanked his hand from his face to grab the offending boot and stare at it with reddened, puffy eyes, as though he had forgotten she was there after all.

"Sorry," he breathed, returning his eyes to the window of stars above. "Things got a little too heavy there, huh?"

He settled her boot on the floor, but didn't let it go, and she didn't force it away. She had nowhere else to go, and besides, it saved him from calling out, and her from having to answer whenever he would drift awake between fitful dreams.

She was there.

That was all she had to give.

**End**

**Chapter 12 Preview:**  "... _Nebula raised one fist to her chest, then twisted her wrist to flash her open palm at the windshield. '_ Alive. _' One flash, and then she dropped it deliberately to her side. '_ Just barely _.'_

_Another frown, this one forming wrinkles in her brow that Nebula could see from across the distance. The next sign was a request to board._

_Nebula snapped her arms up into a large X across her chest._ _'_ Denied _'..._ "

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter is rescue and the start of Earth, yay! It's been so dark lately, I'm excited to get back to some humor and warm fuzzy stuff! Counter pointed with more trauma, of course. Ah, I'm just so excited! It's about half-way done already, so hopefully it will be a quick update this time.
> 
> Thank you for reading! And a big thank you from the bottom of my heart for the comments, you are all so amazing and supportive!
> 
> -OMaM


	12. We're Going Home

**Chapter 12: We're Going Home**

On the mid-point of their twenty first cycle since leaving Titan she stumbled upon the Terran collapsed on the floor of the flight deck. One arm was drawn through the sleeve of the leather coat, the other tucked under his head, as though he had simply given up and fallen asleep half-way through the act of putting it on. His helmet sat nearby in silent vigil, its disfigured eyes empty and devoid of sorrow or pity as its master struggled for life before it.

She had thought, upon her initial discovery, that he was already dead. A strange sort of nausea washed over her body as she reached down to place her fingers against his neck, more than half expecting to find the skin cold and lifeless, perhaps even beginning to stiffen. She had slept for a little longer than she had intended, her body and mind already beginning to betray her in little ways as they conceded defeat in bits and pieces against the imposing death. A pain twisted in her gut as she wondered if he had called out for her, and she had failed to answer...

There was a pulse, incredibly faint but real, and his skin was not quite  _warm_ , but it felt alive, for now. He did not wake, however, as she tugged him from the floor, nor offer any witty commentary as she struggled to hold him up and string his other arm through the empty sleeve of the jacket before dragging him up and into his favored seat where he could lay under the stars. She doubted he would be opening his eyes again, but from here the starlight could wash over his face, and he wouldn't have to die curled up on the filthy floor of the Benatar like some mangy old orlani. When he was settled on the chair, and arranged as comfortably as she could manage, she cast her gaze about in search of the absent blanket. He often took it off to make his recordings.

When it did not immediately come to sight in the flight deck, she thought he may have left it in the other room. As she stepped away, her fingers trailed down his shoulder, and skirted the edge of his faux heart. He was already so cold. Her skin hardly missed the warmth as she pulled her fingers away into the icy air and didn't look back.

There was nothing she could do to stop his dying, but she didn't have to sit here and watch it happen. She would fetch him his blanket, and then she would not return. He could keep the stars. They meant nothing to her now.

As she rifled through the common room a golden glow crept in beneath her feet to wash over the cabin, illuminating the space which had been dark for so long that she had nearly forgotten what it looked like. Had the walls always been that colorful? Ignoring the sparks of dread and hope warring within her, she abandoned her search and cautiously returned to peer around the entrance to the flight deck.

What she found was surprising, even to one who had seen as many strange and unbelievable things as she had; a single body, alight with some sort of burning energy. A female, of that she was reasonably certain as her eyes burned and watered at the bright light after so many cycles of darkness, but from what race she could not yet hazard a guess. They were almost Terran, but the powers they displayed and the lack of protective gear against the unforgiving vacuum of space belied that. Perhaps another half-breed, like her sister's Terran?

In his seat, Tony appeared to have somehow been woken by the burning light. One hand was raised to shield his eyes, but his gaze was unfocused, and no spark of excitement over their rescue lit his face. Likely, he believed this to be some fevered dream. She hardly believed what she was seeing herself.

To further cast doubt on their Terran origin, the dazzling woman lifted her arms in a wordless greeting, a familiar signal often used by scrappers and rescue vessels to communicate with damaged ships which lacked radios. Hope slowly wrestled dread back, and Nebula stepped into sight to return the gesture.

The woman's eyes flickered in surprised recognition when they landed on the assassin, but when her arms shifted to their next signal, it was to inquire after the number of survivors on board. Another standard protocol the stranger flowed through with the ease of one who was well experienced with space travel.

Nebula signed back,  _'Two.'_

A frown. The woman's eyes shifted as though counting the bodies before her.

Hope again grew bolder. Whoever this stranger was, they seemed to have been expecting more survivors. They may have been sent from Earth, and that meant this may be a true rescue after all, and not a hostile takeover.

The stranger pointed at Tony, who was nodding his head slightly, as though he had determined this was a dream after all, and was returning to his rest. Another signal, a broad sweep with both arms inquiring after his condition.

Nebula raised one fist to her chest, then twisted her wrist to flash her open palm at the windshield.  _'Alive.'_  Like the beat of a heart. One flash, and then she dropped it deliberately to her side.  _'Just barely.'_

Another frown, this one forming wrinkles in her pale brow that Nebula could see from across the distance. The next sign was a request to board.

Nebula snapped her arms up into a large X across her chest.  _'Denied.'_

Clearly, the stranger had not been expecting that. She gave the request again, a bit more forcefully this time, like she was certain she had been misunderstood.

 _'Denied.'_  Nebula repeated, then, after a moment's consideration added;  _'Low atmosphere.'_

She turned a meaningful glance at the Terran beside her who had lowered his hand back to his chest and closed his eyes. Rescue or not, they couldn't spare the oxygen it would cost to allow someone to board from space. It would be best of whoever this stranger was would stop trying to interrogate them through the windshield and take them onto whatever ship she had come here on.

The stranger, at last, seemed to understand, biting her lip as she gave up on her request and stared thoughtfully at the dying man. When she met Nebula's eyes again, it was with a new signal, a warning to prepare for a tow. It was Nebula's turn to deepen her frown. Who knew how long a tow could take? The nearest jump was a long time away, even with a fresh ship. They needed to be taken on board.  _Tony needed to be taken on board._  Before she could gather a reply, however, the woman had vanished, dipping under the ship as gracefully as though she were flying.

Nebula waited for the ship to appear to tow them, but no such sight came. She was so busy craning her head about in search of some sign of the vessel, that she almost didn't notice the pattern in which the stars were moving in time. As the ground lurched underneath her -an illusion caused by the gravity center struggling to re-calibrate inside a worm hole- she grabbed the Terran roughly by the shoulders and pinned him to his seat to prevent him from being jostled or thrown to the floor as they entered a jump point that, by all her knowledge, shouldn't exist here.

At her touch, Tony drew himself again from sleep, this time he managed to turn his head and focus his eyes on her.

"Space-girl?" he asked.

"I believe you're friends have found you."

A hand reached up to settle over one of hers and give it a weak squeeze. " _We're going home,"_  he breathed, a smile that didn't quite make it to his lips danced in the deepest depths of his tired eyes.

She didn't correct him.

-x-

Earth appeared in unreasonable time, but she would not complain in the face of this latest twist of fortune. The ground grew closer, details resolving through the dark of night into a white compound with an open field before it, and Nebula tugged the Terran to his feet. Some realization of what was happening stirred him to life, but even so, she was left supporting most of his weight as she all but carried him towards the loading ramp to greet the first rush of new oxygen as the hatch opened.

Fresh air and wet grass had never smelled so sweet in all her life. Her lungs had nearly forgotten what it was to breath without herculean effort, and she allowed herself to take a deep satisfying breath as she helped the Terran pick his way down the stairs. His companions were already rushing across the field to meet them. A man with short blond hair sprung up the ramp, hardly sparing her a glance before tugging Tony's free arm over his own shoulder and twisting to plow ahead, back towards the compound from which he had just come. When Nebula released her grip, allowing Tony's weight to be snatched away without protest, he twisted to shoot her a startled look,a strange rush of terror overtaking his eyes for the briefest moment.

She didn't dare speak her reassurances, not with so many unfamiliar witnesses, but she tried to convey her intentions with her eyes as he was tugged away. Not long after he was met with a second companion which swept up his attention, a woman with long straight hair that flashed a pale gold in the compound lights. From the relief with which he met her, Nebula assumed this must be Pepper, and she spared him no further thought, secure in the knowledge he would be cared for as she turned her thoughts to a more immediate responsibility which was rushing across the field now, with white tipped ears pricked high in a hope she was doomed to crush.

Exhausted from her trek, and the shock of rescue, she slumped down to sit on the steps while the fox approached. As he drew near, he slowed, his hopeful ears drawing back and the white markings across his brows making his expression of grief all the more stark in the poor light.

No words were exchanged as he tip toed up the steps, eyes glued to her face as though hoping at any moment she might proclaim it all a joke, and the family he was waiting for would leap from the ship. Again, she found herself suddenly in the place of filling in for what should have been anyone else. A poor replacement, with nothing in her pockets, or on her tongue, and nothing to give but her company.

The fox flopped down to sit next to her, his back hunched and whiskers drooped miserably. He understood. There was no need to say it out loud, and she appreciated that, at least. After a moment at her side, he lifted one heavily modified paw and patted the back of her hand in a gesture that was strangely reminiscent of the Terran. Almost without thought, she twisted her palm up to take his hand, and offer her own comfort in turn. Somehow, he had become the closest thing to familiar she had left in this strange universe.

"What-" His voice hitched, and he had to clear his throat before starting over. "What happened to 'em?"

She gazed around at the empty compound, save for the last of the Terrans chasing their injured companion back into the bright compound. The tree was nowhere in sight, and the fox was never far from his youngest companion."

"I think you already know."

His answer was a grunt.

After that they sat in silence again until his hand grew too warm in hers and he pulled it away.

"You're not lookin' so hot there, Nebula." He still didn't look at her directly as he stood, and she marveled at how strange the sound of her own name had become. "Why don't I show you where the kitchen is in this dump? I could use a mornin' snack."

Nebula heaved herself back to her feet, forcing her tired body to life for the promise of food and water. They hadn't made it half-way across the short cropped grass, however, before the compound door swung open again and the strange, impossible woman who had found them in the deepest dredges of space stepped through.

Nebula hadn't forgotten the recognition on the stranger's face when she had first spotted the infamous assassin, and now Nebula stopped to watch her approach warily. Rocket slowed to a stop as well, shooting his companion a confused look as her shoulders stiffened and her fingers curled into fists that made her hands ache at the effort. She was in no condition to put up much of a struggle if it came down to real blows, but she would not simply roll over and accept her fate gracefully either.

When the stranger reached them, however, she just paused to hold out a bottle of water in one hand, and a bar of something in the other.

"For you," the woman pressed, waving the bottle in emphasis when Nebula just stared at it through narrowed eyes as though she were being handed poison. If her reputation had proceeded her, it may be. The woman sighed, snapping the top off in one swift motion and took a giant swig of the drink. "It's just water," she said, wiping at her lips and again shoving the bottle at Nebula who accepted it wordlessly, eyes still on the stranger.

"You're Nebula, right? I recognized you right away. Thanos's daughter."

"She's a Guardian, now," Rocket surprised them both by speaking up, his ears tipped back at the blond woman in an obvious display of warning. "You jus' didn't get her in the briefing 'cause I didn't expect her to be there. Seems it's lucky she was, or your guy'd be space-toast."

Nebula felt her brows wrinkle at the unexpected defense but she supposed, just as he was her last shard of familiarity and connection to anything worthwhile from her life before, she was his.

"Relax," the woman held her now free hand up in appeasement. "I'm not here to start a fight." Her eyes rose to meet Nebula's gaze, a tiredness in them that belied her otherwise youthful appearance. "I'm the last person to be judging you, anyways."

Nebula narrowed her eyes against a fresh wave of confusion. The drink in her hand was growing heavy, and her legs were beginning to shout their protest at standing for so long, but she refused to shift and show her weakness.

"My name is Carol Danvers, but I used to go by Vers for a while, when I served under Ronan." A wry smile curled at Carol's lips. "I've spent a great deal of time traveling across the universe trying to right my own wrongs, and I heard all about the assault on Xandar. We served under the same general if I'm not mistaken."

This was news to Nebula. Admittedly, she hadn't cared to know much about the Kree warlord from before her brief shift at his side. Her interest extended no further than the hope that he might prove a weapon worthy enough to wield against her father. Instead, he had met a swift and pitiful demise at the hands of her own sister's new family.

"Well," Carol continued, with a meaningful look at the bottle Nebula still hadn't raised to her own lips, "enough standing around in the dark. Why don't we go inside?" She stepped back and tugged the door she had come through open again, a bright golden light flooding out to sting Nebula's eyes.

Rocket followed her right in, and Nebula stepped in afterwards. Her eyes adjusted painfully to the lights as the door clicked shut behind them, and Carol typed something into a small pad beside the entrance. An alarm, no doubt. Briefly, Nebula wondered if Thanos had left any form of threat behind in his wake. She doubted it, it wasn't his usual style to linger on planets like this when he was through with them. But then, with his task finally completed, who was to say that he was bound by his usual patterns?

"If you need the infirmary, I'm sure there's still room-"

"I'm fine," Nebula interrupted in a tone that invited no argument. Something twisted in her gut, a strange tugging that urged her to take the invitation if only to set her eyes on the companion which had been spirited away. She hated infirmaries, however, with enough passion to effectively drown out the much newer and weaker emotions within her which could not yet identify. He would be safe. He was among his own people now. If the tugging persisted, then perhaps she would find a way to slip in later, when the others had left.

The edges of Carol's lips twisted downward at the tactless refusal, but she relented and dropped the arm that had been raised to point towards an open doorway to her left. "Okay. If you change your mind, it's two rights, and a left. Hard to miss. I'll let you be, now." Carol skirted around the last remains of the Guardians and made a line for an open doorway that led deeper into the compound. Before she vanished entirely she spun around to point a finger in the opposite direction. "The kitchen is that way. Guest rooms and bunks are further down the main hall. I'm sure Rocket can help you find anything else you need."

And then she was gone with a flick of gold hair and the crisp stomp of her boots fading quickly after.

"Eh, don't mind her too much," Rocket mumbled, scratching at the back of one ear. "She's just upset she came so late to the party. I think all'a her friends got dusted, too. C'mon, let's get somethin' that doesn't have her germs all over it."

Nebula smirked and dumped the contents of the bottle into a nearby plant as they passed it.

Whoever this Carol Danvers was, she was no normal Terran, and if she knew as much about Nebula and her status among the rest of the universe outside of this isolated dirtball as she had hinted, then she warranted watching. With the return of oxygen and all the precious things that promised life, came the return of reality as well, and there was no alley dark enough, or back-road deep enough to escape the looming shadow of who she really was. Even as her body cried out in relief at the food and water which awaited her, an ominous weight settled in her stomach and dragged at her heels.

**End**

**Chapter 13 Preview:** "... _Yeah, well, you don't smell so great yourself, Miss Potts," he lied, thinking he could spend the rest of the day with his nose buried in her much-too-fruity and slightly greasy hair._

_When she pulled away again his head felt clearer than it had in days, and he craned his head around her in search of a familiar blue face. He was met with nothing but the pale and pastel colors of the recovery room, and an empty bed beside him._

_"Where's Space-girl?._.."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I waited the entire movie for some mention of how Nebula and Carol technically both worked for Ronan at some point. It never came. lol.
> 
> I don't intend for them to remain at odds.
> 
> Okay, soooo this is where I realize I don't remember the exact details of the chain of events in the opening of the movie between rescue and the time skip as I had hoped. I'm going to do my best to keep things in some semblance of order, and just... be vague about what I can, but don't be afraid to speak up or message me if I bungle something and it's just super contradictory. I might be able to fix it, I might not, but at least I'll know... I'm sure I will mess some stuff up, though. I haven't watched it since it first came out. There's a few clips on Youtube which help, a little, but not all that much.
> 
> Also! Starting next update, the chapters with switch between stronger focuses/points of view with Nebula and Tony according to whoever I think fits that chapter better. Next one will be Tony's perspective.
> 
> Less exciting announcement, is because this project expanded longer than I had envisioned, I'll be using lines from other Blue October songs as titles. Otherwise I'll just... run out. The last chapter, which I've had planned for a while now, will still be Titled "She's my Ride Home," though.
> 
> Thank you for reading!
> 
> -OMaM

**Author's Note:**

> So this is my first piece completely unrelated to my GotG/Avengers AU, Astronautical.
> 
> The Nebula and Tony scene about killed me. I could watch an entire movie of just what they did there for 21 days, and so this speculation fic was born. I don't know how many chapters it will be. At least until they get back to Earth, and I might include a few small blips after that. They're just, so cute! And I need more of their interactions!
> 
> Hope you enjoy!
> 
> -OMaM


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